[japhyr]

I've been a casual birder for a couple years now. I've been hearing about the Merlin app for a while, but never installed it until this past week. It has profoundly changed my experience of looking for birds.

If you're unfamiliar with the app, you can start recording on your phone and it will tell you in real time which birds are singing nearby. I haven't used it for positive identifications, just for knowing which birds are nearby. I've had numerous experiences already where a species I had no idea about was nearby, then a few minutes of looking confirmed the species it had identified. If you're a birder and you haven't tried Merlin, I highly encourage you to give it a try. It has also opened my eyes to a few species that spend almost all their time in the canopy and in heavy brush, which are really hard to spot unless you know they're around, and make time to look for them in those areas.

Using the Merlin app has also led to interesting conversations with people about how ML models work. People assume there's a bank of recordings that the app is constantly comparing your live recording against, which I don't believe is the case. The "bird packs" you have to download do contain a bunch of sound files, but those are available so you can play songs for birds you're interested in. I don't believe the identification algorithm is actively using those recordings.

https://merlin.allaboutbirds.org

[HelloMcFly]

Merlin has altered my relationship to the natural world, even in my urban neighborhood. I'm much, much more "present" when I'm walking. Even when I'm not using the app, I'm always listening. When I go hiking, it's always with me (it works in airplane mode).

[finger]

I’ve been using BirdNET for a few years now. Looks like it is the same university that makes Merlin.

[squeaky-clean]

BirdNET has more data and more species but Merlin can work in real-time on your phone without internet.

[nerdponx]

I've been using BirdNet for a while. Is Merlin significantly better?

[nemo]

They're both run by Cornell Labs though BirdNET has a larger data training set. They both use the McCauley library, but BirdNET uses more data beyond that for training so it's actually better than Merlin for that. Merlin's got a lot more functionality than just audio ids, though.

[awithrow]

Merlin really is great. My wife and I refer to it as Shazam for birds.

[clumsysmurf]

I wonder if there is anything like this for snakes.

[pvaldes]

"For some reason, nobody wanted to try our Snake attractor 3000"

[markdown]

Don't they all just go sssssss?

[moi2388]

With the exception of rattle snakes perhaps