Easily identify the birds you hear with Merlin Bird ID [Awesome Apps]

Spring is here, and the air is full of birdsong. The Merlin Bird ID app tells you what type of birds you’re hearing … plus it’s quick, easy and free.

With this software from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology on your iPhone, you can learn about all the birds around you — you might be surprised how many of them there are. And if you get interested, you’ll soon be able to identify them without the app.

Merlin Bird ID improves birdwatching

This time of year, walk outside in the morning and you’ll be greeted with a cacophony of birdsong. It’s only natural to wonder what’s making all the noise.

Sure, you can grab some binoculars and a bird guide and peer up into the trees looking for those loud-mouthed avians, but Merlin Bird ID simplifies the process. You can sit back, open the app and let it list off all the birds it hears near you.

Sound ID is brilliant

The centerpiece of Merlin Bird ID is Sound ID. When you start this feature on your iPhone, the app puts everything it can hear through a spectrogram — a graph of audio frequencies over time. Thanks to clever machine learning, Merlin can recognize the patterns that bird calls make in this spectrogram.

I’ve used this application for years and found it quite accurate. To test it, I’ve asked the software to identify a bird by its call, then visually confirmed that it picked the correct species. It got it right, time after time.

It’s a great app, especially considering it’s free.

How to use Merlin Bird ID

Begin by downloading Merlin Bird ID from the App Store for the low, low price of $0. You can put it on your iPhone or iPad. (There’s an Android version, too.)

Once you have the app open on your device, look for the big green Sound button near the middle of the screen. Tap on it.

A spectrogram will start to scroll across your iPhone screen. This should be quickly followed by a list of birds singing within earshot. The software is quick — I live in the suburbs, and it’s rare for the app to not identify at least four nearby birds in less than a minute.

The app will suggest you install what it calls bird packs. Sound ID does not require these to work, but without one, the app can only list the names of the species it detects. Bird packs include additional information about each species, including pictures. They add considerably to the experience.

With the applicable bird packs installed, you can tap on the name of a bird identified near you to learn more about it.

Don’t be concerned that bird packs are sneaky way to get cash out of you — they’re also free. They do take storage room, though. The one for the U.S. Midwest is 422 MB, for example.

Learn the bird calls

Among the items in a bird pack for each species are examples of its calls. Merlin Bird ID might tell you a white-throated sparrow is nearby, and once you hear it isolated from all the other calls around you, you’ll be able to recognize the call for yourself. You won’t need to app to know there’s a white-throated sparrow nearby.

This works for many common birds. I learned to identify the usual visitors to my yard, like cardinals, catbirds and Carolina wrens.

At this point, my most frequent use of Merlin Bird ID is to identify some odd bird I’ve never heard before … though it often turns it to be a weird sound I didn’t realize a blue jay could make.

Now get out the binoculars

Earlier, I didn’t mean to disparage using binoculars to look for birds. I just don’t think that should be the first step. Once Merlin Bird ID has shown you what’s nearby, grab a pair of binoculars to try and spot the ones the app identified.

It’s more fun this way. You can say, “There’s that sparrow I’ve been listening to all morning,” rather than “Look, there’s a … bird.”

To be clear, Merlin Bird ID does help you identify birds by their appearance. You can submit a picture of it, or go through a step-by-step process to describe the bird to the app. Neither option is anywhere near as quick and easy as Sound ID, though.

Start a bird life list

If you really get into bird watching — it seems to be almost obligatory once you reach a certain age — this app includes a Life List to let you easily track every bird you’ve ever run across.

And that might be a good reason to use the alternative ways to identify birds. If, for example, you want to add the bald eagle you see on vacation to your Life List, Sound ID probably isn’t the best way to go about that.

Give Merlin Bird ID a try

You’re sitting out on the patio in the morning, drinking coffee and listening to the birds chatter their little heads off. Now you can use your iPhone to identify which of our feathered friends you’re hearing.

Merlin Bird ID can be downloaded from the App Store now.

It’s free, but signing up and creating an account (necessary for the Life List feature) opens you up for emails from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology asking for contributions to help preserve bird species. It’s a small price for a brilliant application.