A last-chance-to-see, by ear
Dawn Chorus
Quest.
The dawn chorus is one of the great free joys of being alive — and it is getting quieter each year. Learn fifty British voices by ear. Hear what has already faded. And glimpse two very different mornings fifty years from now.
Our quest: to cherish the chorus, and help it grow louder.
Fully playable without sound — every song is visualised and described.
The dawn chorus plays softly as ambience. Prefer silence, or can't hear it? Open the written description for a sense of what the recording sounds like.
Six mornings to listen to
Start with the warm-up if you're new. Work back through the chorus to 1975, when fifty species woke the country — then forward, to two possible 2076s. One we make on purpose; one we drift into.
Welcome — five easy birds
Five very distinctive voices, two choices each. A gentle introduction to playing by ear.
5 birds · 5 questions · 2 choices →
Dawn chorus, today
Ten birds you might still hear from a British garden at first light. The chorus has thinned — these are the survivors.
10 birds · 10 questions · 4 choices →
Dawn chorus, year 2000
Around 30 species would have layered the dawn — sparrows in flocks, swifts overhead, warblers everywhere.
30 birds · 10 questions · 4 choices →
Dawn chorus, 1975
Cuckoos, turtle doves, corn buntings — fifty species woke the country. Many are now red-listed or gone from most of Britain.
50 birds · 10 questions · 4 choices →
If we cherish the chorus
Fifty years of hedgerows replanted, pesticides retired and skies left a little darker. The cuckoo is back. The nightingale is louder. The whole chorus.
52 birds · 10 questions · 4 choices →
If we don't
A last-chance-to-see round. Seven hardy generalists — pigeons, crows, the odd robin — singing into a quieter morning. Hope it stays fiction.
7 birds · 7 questions · 4 choices →