(Advanced) The Sounds of the Forest

Nobody ever forgets the first time that they hear or see a tiger. But as Chris Watson discovers when he travels to Corbett National Park in India this is far from easy. What he uncovers is a fascinating relationship between the people and the forest environment in which listening plays a vital role. Amongst the dense vegetation you can hear far more than you can see. As a wildlife sound recordist from North East England, Chis is immediately exited by the range of new sounds he can hear; a soundscape which changes throughout the day and night.

Listening provides vital sound clues as to the activities and whereabouts of the wildlife. Local people learn to recognise and interpret these sounds; for example different species of birds call at different times of the day. And recognising when a tiger is near from the alarm calls of birds in the canopy, could save your life, as could knowing which direction you are travelling by the sounds and direction of the wind. Living with Nature in this way results in extraordinary relationships between the people and the forest.

The sounds of the Forest

(Advanced) The Sounds of the Lofoten Islands

Wildlife sound recordist Chris Watson accompanies Sami Joiker, Andé Sombe, on a journey up a mountain on the Lofoten islands in Norway to explore the relationship between the sounds of the mountain, the people and the wildlife.

As Chris discovers, for many Norwegians the soundscape is part of the fascination and attraction of the mountains. The mountains offer an escape from urban and man-made noise to Nature’s symphony which is composed amongst other things of the sounds of running water produced by the glacial streams, the whisper and roar of the wind, the chorus of song birds and the cry of soaring ravens high overhead.

Looking around Chris is reminded that this is an Arctic landscape but in recent years the glacial ice has been melting in some of Norway’s highest mountains and we learn how a team of archaeologists have been recovering thousands of artefacts, some of which date back 6,000 years.

But it is also the quality of the sounds here that intrigues Chris, and during the climb gradually he begins to understand something of the deeper more spiritual connection with the earth which is so intrinsic to the Sami culture.

For Andé the mountain soundscape and his relationship to the wolves which were once so prevalent here, inspires a joik, a Sami chant, which he performs at the peak of their climb.

The Sounds of the Lofoten Islands

(Advanced) The Sounds of the Namib Desert

Beginning with a few solo notes from a group of birds (including sparrow doves and finches) before the first light of day and ending with the sounds of the wind in the darkness of the night, wildlife sound recordist Chris Watson presents a journey in sound from dawn to dusk in the Namib Desert in southern Africa.

The Namib is dominated by two features; the sand and the wind. Both of these are constantly shifting and changing and so too are the sounds they produce. The wind is hugely significant to the local community, the San, for whom it is linked with ideas of the spirit and breath of life and with scents and smells. The wind is a carrier of messages. There are good winds and bad winds. The sounds carried on the wind are an aural guide to life in the landscape.

The wind of course carries other sounds with it, and as on the Plains (the first programme in this series), local people use sound to survive here; to identify the whereabouts of predators and prey.

What is also fascinating about the desert are the micro-sounds that you can hear, including sand grains being blown by the wind, ants scurrying inside an acacia tree, and the slither of a side-winder snake as it buries itself in the dune. Then there are louder sounds, like the Namaqua Sandgrouse which gather to drink and bathe, or the night chorus of barking geckos; small reptiles that live in individual burrows which they use to amplify their songs, which then ring out across the desert and into the night.

And all the time, there is the wind, the sand and the eerie shifting sounds of the dunes.

The Sounds of the Namib Desert