Northwest Soundscapes

At 2.5 miles Ape Cave is the longest continuous lava tube in the contiguous United States, and the third longest in North America. Formed approximately 2000 years ago, it's difficult yet fun hike. From time to time I like to venture in and record all night (to avoid the disturbance of other hikers during the day). In November 2019 I returned for another night of hiking and recording. This time I m...

At 2.5 miles Ape Cave is the longest continuous lava tube in the contiguous United States, and the third longest in North America. Formed approximately 2000 years ago, it's difficult yet fun hike. From time to time I like to venture in and record all night (to avoid the disturbance of other hikers during the day). In November 2019 I returned for another night of hiking and recording. This time I m...

At 2.5 miles Ape Cave is the longest continuous lava tube in the contiguous United States, and the third longest in North America. Formed approximately 2000 years ago, it's difficult yet fun hike. From time to time I like to venture in and record all night (to avoid the disturbance of other hikers during the day). In November 2019 I returned for another night of hiking and recording. This time I m...

At 2.5 miles Ape Cave is the longest continuous lava tube in the contiguous United States, and the third longest in North America. Formed approximately 2000 years ago, it's difficult yet fun hike. From time to time I like to venture in and record all night (to avoid the disturbance of other hikers during the day). In November 2019 I returned for another night of hiking and recording. This time I m...

At 2.5 miles Ape Cave is the longest continuous lava tube in the contiguous United States, and the third longest in North America. Formed approximately 2000 years ago, it's difficult yet fun hike. In December 2017 I spent a night hiking and meditating through the cave with a good friend. There's nothing quite like the peace and quiet of a lonely cave to help you focus on your thoughts. It had been...

At 2.5 miles Ape Cave is the longest continuous lava tube in the contiguous United States, and the third longest in North America. Formed approximately 2000 years ago, it's difficult yet fun hike. In December 2017 I spent a night hiking and meditating through the cave with a good friend. There's nothing quite like the peace and quiet of a lonely cave to help you focus on your thoughts. It had been...

At 2.5 miles Ape Cave is the longest continuous lava tube in the contiguous United States, and the third longest in North America. Formed approximately 2000 years ago, it's difficult yet fun hike. In December 2017 I spent a night hiking and meditating through the cave with a good friend. There's nothing quite like the peace and quiet of a lonely cave to help you focus on your thoughts. It had been...

At 2.5 miles Ape Cave is the longest continuous lava tube in the contiguous United States, and the third longest in North America. Formed approximately 2000 years ago, it's difficult yet fun hike. In December 2017 I spent a night hiking and meditating through the cave with a good friend. There's nothing quite like the peace and quiet of a lonely cave to help you focus on your thoughts. It had been...

At 2.5 miles Ape Cave is the longest continuous lava tube in the contiguous United States, and the third longest in North America. Formed approximately 2000 years ago, it's difficult yet fun hike. In December 2017 I spent a night hiking and meditating through the cave with a good friend. There's nothing quite like the peace and quiet of a lonely cave to help you focus on your thoughts. It had been...

Odd twittery pop vocalizations and beak snaps from a North American Common Raven, August 2020 Processed to remove unwanted noise

Trogdor the Rooster. After every crow roosters make this sound like they're either aggravated at having to crow or distressed at the effort it took. Give the lineage we know from theropod dinosaurs down to birds, I now imagine Tyrannosaurs feeling compelled to crow like this every morning, including the frustration at the end. Maybe it's frustration at trying to use those tiny little arms to do an...

Recently I learned about the Veery or Catharus Fuscescens. I'd known the name but never really paid attention. Even in their breeding range they barely bump into my usual listening haunts. Every so often while recording a popular and common Pacific Northwest Voice, the Swainson's Thrush, I'd hear a particularly sad sounding song. Swainson's have a beautiful uplifting, spiraling away flute-like sou...

In the quiet of the Hoh Rainforest of Olympic National Park, heavy rain falls on Vine Maples and dense underbrush of ferns, grasses, and other large-leaf ground cover. On this day, 2020-09-23, the park saw nearly its entire expected monthly precipitation (6.37 in/ 162 mm) in one 24 hour hard rainfall (5.93 in/ 151 mm), swelling the Hoh River into a raging monster that swept away trees along the sh...

In the quiet of the Hoh Rainforest of Olympic National Park, heavy rain falls on tall stands of Sitka Spruce. On this day, 2020-09-23, the park saw nearly its entire expected monthly precipitation (6.37 in/ 162 mm) in one 24 hour hard rainfall (5.93 in/ 151 mm), swelling the Hoh River into a raging monster that swept away trees along the shore. This recording is from an in-land quiet area about fo...

In the still, quiet night air of the Olympic National Park's Queets Rain Forest river valley, a lone Barred Owl sings from a nearby tree. It's voice echoing off the majestic trees of this old-growth rain forest, it calls longingly, awaiting an answer from the darkness that may never come.

On the morning of 2020-07-01, particularly chatty Yellow-breasted Chat provided us a long pre-Dawn soliloquy while hanging out in some deciduous coverage with the microphones. Nearby Pied-billed Grebe and cattle make the occasional appearance. An AmericanRobin even makes a brief appearance just before First Light at the end of this track. image credit: "852 - YELLOW-BREASTED CHAT (6-1-11) de anza...

While taking my college-aged child on a 2020 quarantine-fueled road trip of some of my favorite recording places, we were gifted by the world with this beautiful Dawn Chorus near Forde Lake. From the 0419 am First light through Sunrise, I wanted to know what the dawn sounded like to a tree. Hanging a pair of small omni in "tree ears" fashion about 6 feet up in a young Ponderosa Pine, we discovered...

While taking my college-aged child on a 2020 quarantine-fueled road trip of some of my favorite recording places, we were gifted by the world with this beautiful Dawn Chorus at Forde Lake. From the 0419 am First light through Sunrise we listen to the world wake up through the canopy of deciduous coverage near the slow-moving Sinlahekin Creek. Light rain briefly patters on Quaking Aspen and Maple a...

While taking my college-aged child on a 2020 quarantine-fueled road trip of some of my favorite recording places, we were gifted by the world with this beautiful and dense Dawn Chorus at Long Swamp. Starting in Astronomical Twilight at 0353 am, 23 minutes before First Light, and running through 40 minutes after Sunrise, this track features a wetland shrub area in Long Swamp and faint water burbles...

This lively dawn chorus was recorded in a small pothole coulee in Eastern Washington, one of the numerous Seep Lakes of the Channeled Scablands. This is the Columbia Plateau, a large basalt flow cut through by the Columbia River. During the last ice age, 10-20 thousand years ago, the ice dam blocking Glacial Lake Missoula collapsed, unleashing one of the largest known ancient mega-floods. This flo...

blog: http://soundeziner.com/2020/05/long-swamp-dusk-20190716/ I’ve fallen in love with the Okanogan mountains, the wet meadows, swampy bogs, forests, grassy ridge tops, and more. Most of the naturally quiet locations are difficult to reach from Seattle, but that’s fine by me. It just means more opportunities to record with without interruption. On the night of 2019-07-17 I camped, once again, nea...

blog: http://soundeziner.com/2020/05/long-swamp-dawn-20190717/ This is my last Long Swamp post. I promise. From 2019. As I mentioned in last night's Dusk track, https://soundcloud.com/soundeziner/20190716-long-swamp-dusk, I've fallen in love with the mountains of the Okanogan. The wet meadows, swampy bogs, dense forests, deep riparian zones, grassy ridge tops, and more are perfect for finding soni...

Just a few miles away and a little farther up the mountains from Thirtymile Meadows (https://soundcloud.com/soundeziner/20190714_thirtymiledawn) can be found Long Swamp, a very large, highly biodiverse wetland complex. Like the wet meadows, swamps in this area form through the collection of meltwater of the preceding winter. Unlike the shallow bowls of the meadows, though, the swamps form in the s...

Thirtymile Meadows is a wet, subalpine meadow high in the Okanogan National Forest. A natural shallow bowl, it collects meltwater from each winter and slowly drains away through innumerable soft tinkling streams. In such a wide open space it can be difficult to know where to point microphones. When I visited in the Summer of 2019 I was never certain where the next morning's dawn chorus would arriv...

A year ago this time I was listening to and watching dawn (still twilight, ~5:15, but active already) from one of my favorite locations in the Sinlahekin Wildlife Area with my good friend Jason Wolford. It was the first time I'd introduced another recordist to one of my favorite places, and it did not disappoint. The temperature was chilly, barely above freezing, but the birds were abundant. Ruffe...