The Ultimate Illustrated Guide to the Birds of Britain and Europe

Peter Hayman and Rob Hume

Notes, images, and songs for 250 British and European Birds for iPod, PC, and Mac

CONTENTS

1. Installation instructions
2. Operating the BIRD notes on the iPod
3. Hints for effective use
4. System requirements
5. Credits

1. Installation Instructions
The program and data are provided on the CD as a zipped folder. To install, follow these steps:

• Copy the file "MB BIRD guide.zip" onto your desktop.
• Double click to expand the file (creates a folder called "MB BIRD guide").
• Drag the folder "birdsongs" from this folder to iTunes.*
• Copy the folder "BIRDnotes" from this folder to the notes section on your iPod hard disk.**

To open the BIRD database open the MB BIRD guide folder and for PC click on STARTbirdguidePC, for Apple Macintosh click on STARTbirdguideMAC.

Once everything is working, the zip file may be discarded and the MB BIRD guide folder stored wherever you wish on your hard disk.

* The default settings are to copy across all music files to your iPod, but if you have altered this, you may have to select the playlist "BIRD" to be synchronized in iTunes by using the iPod options panel in iTunes.

** This action requires the setting "enable disk use" to be selected in the iPod options in iTunes (the default setting is off, so it will need to be changed if it has not been done before). This makes the iPod visible as a disk on the desktop.

2. Operating the BIRD notes on the iPod
From the iPod menu select "Extras" then "Notes". (The first time you access the Notes section, they have to load into memory. This process takes a minute or so to do, but afterwards the access is more immediate.)

To use the notes, you can scroll through the entire bird listings by Common Name or Species (latin name) or you can select lists of birds by Category (book category), Family, Order, or Habitat.

When you select a note about a particular species, information is listed in the following way:

• Common name (TITLE)
• SPECIES LINK to picture & song (in the music section)
• FAMILY: (LINK to family list)
• ORDER: (LINK to order list)
• Bird description: (text detailing the birds appearance, habits, voice, migration and where commonly seen)
  file number
• >> next (LINK to next bird in library)
• << previous (LINK to previous bird in library)

To select a link use the scroll wheel to highlight the link underline in blue and click the centre button.

When selecting the link to a picture & song, the screen shows a small image of the bird and plays its song. Clicking the centre button twice again reveals the full-size image on the screen. Click
again and the VOICE description is listed. Click the Menu button to back up the display to the bird notes again.

Note: If you leave the bird song playing, the iPod will return to showing the bird image and song currently playing after a short period of inactivity. To prevent this, pause the song after you have finished listening to it before returning to the BIRD notes.

3. Hints for effective use
The best way to identify a bird is to have an initial guess at a bird that it is most like. Then you can check with other birds in the same family (by clicking on the family list and checking with each member), taking into account the visual appearance and the song, if heard, to make a better guess. Also take into account the location and the habitat, which should match, but may not prove conclusive. When attempting to identify a bird from its song, bear in mind that some species show considerable variations in their song, but that the voice should be distinctive.

In the bird song section for each bird, you can apply a rating (1 to 5 stars). This can be used as a tally for indicating which birds you have spotted and what confidence you would have in their identification.

Identifying birds is a skill that improves with experience, and involves using as many lines of evidence supplied by the bird in question to identify it correctly. Bird song is an invaluable aid in this process, especially when its source is hidden or poorly visible, and it can bring your attention an interesting or unknown bird that you might otherwise walk by. Memorizing bird songs at first seems a daunting task, but by choosing a single bird song at a time and listening out for them, they are quickly memorized. After this it becomes impossible to forget as they constantly remind you when you are out in the wilds passing them by.

4. System Requirements

Mac: OSX 10.3.9 or above with iTunes 6 or above
or
PC:Windows XP or Vista with iTunes 6 or above

iPod: (5G) Video (with 200MB disk space free for full installation) or iPod Nano (3G with 200MB disk space free for full installation). Earlier Nanos will not link all the text notes fully.

5. Credits
The BIRD guide for iPod was developed and designed by Anatole Beams using FileMaker Pro.

The recordings were provided by Dave Farrow (www.shortwing.co.uk), with the majority of sounds used in the programme recorded and edited by him. Additional recordings were provided by Hannu Jannes, Jan-Erik Bruun and (www.wildsounds.co.uk)/Jean C. Roche.

© Mitchell Beazley 2007
iTunes, iPod, QuickTime, Macintosh, and Mac OS are trademarks of Apple Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries.
FileMaker Pro is a trademark of FileMaker Inc., registered in the US and other countries.