Listening Skills

Besides fun and adventure, one thing I've really picked up from participating in the owl and frog/toad surveys is improving my listening skills.  I pay more attention to the sounds of nature. I want to know what I am hearing when I am outside. I always knew the sound of a pheasant.  Pheasant used to scare the bejeebers out of the childhood me when I walked the field behind our house. And in my family, the first one to say "pheasant" when they hear a pheasant call wins.  They win nothing except being the first to say pheasant which is a surprising huge deal.  We're strangely competitive when it comes to identifying the sound of a pheasant. I knew the call of a robin and a blue jay and a crow and a chickadee and the Woody Woodpecker sound of a pileated woodpecker. But the others I have had to learn. I spent a year figuring out one bird that turnd out to be a squirrel.  Just a few weeks ago I learned the "tock tock" was also not a bird but a chipmunk.  Besides chipmunk, other new birds sounds I have learned in 2011 are the house wren, the red bellied woodpecker, white breasted nuthatch, common yellow throat and the bluebird. If I can continue to learn five new sounds a year, I will be happy with my improvement in listening skills.