Calls of the Wild

Macaulay Library opens its archives to the public, releasing more than 80,000 sound and video recordings online

By Miyoko Chu

For decades, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology has shared the remarkable sounds of birds and other animals with the public through audio guides featuring recordings hand-picked from the Macaulay Library's vast collection. Now everyone can explore the archive's holdings on their own. For the first time, more than 65,000 sound clips and some 18,000 video clips of birds and other animals are accessible for free at the Macaulay Library's web site www.animal behaviorarchive.org.

Visitors to the web site can listen to birds such as this meadowlark, while watching a real-time spectrogram and waveform scroll across the screen. Video footage is also available for some species.

"We've long dreamed of swinging the doors to the archive open. Technology and dedicated work by our staff are, at last, making this a realization," said Greg Budney, acting director of the Macaulay Library. "That's important to our core mission in education and scientific research."

Although the online material currently has a North American emphasis, it also includes a generous sampling from around the world. Visitors to the web site can listen to the "Best of Collection," such as a western diamondback rattlesnake responding to a potential threat or a Satin Bowerbird courting mates. Visitors can also search the collection for any animal, whether it's a backyard bird, a killer whale from Antarctica, or an insect from Malaysia.

Birders, students, and researchers alike can learn about the sounds by listening to a recording and viewing an adjustable spectrogram and waveform of the sound as it scrolls across the screen. The Macaulay Library's IT team developed this interactive visualization tool, called Raven Viewer, as part of the Lab's Raven family of sound analysis tools.

©Gerrit Vyn

Raven Viewer is the first and only player that allows real-time visualization of sounds on the Internet. The player recently won second place in Science magazine's "Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge," which recognizes outstanding achievement in the use of visual media to promote understanding of scientific phenomena.

The Macaulay Library will continue to make more recordings available online. Meanwhile, come visit the world's largest archive of wildlife sounds and associated video at www.animalbehaviorarchive.org.

For permission to reprint all or part of this article, please contact Laura Erickson, editor, Cornell Lab of Ornithology, 159 Sapsucker Woods Rd., Ithaca, NY, 14850. Phone: (607) 254-1114. email: lle24@cornell.edu