Soundscapes - Yosemite nature notes - Episode 29

[birds singing] [woodpecker drumming] [red winged blackbird sings] [faint rumble of waterfall] WOMAN: When I ask visitors what they like about being here people often say the quiet. [bird singing] and then we begin a conversation about well, is it really quiet? There's actually a lot of natural sounds that are soothing and calming and these natural sounds aren't really quiet. [woodpecker's loud drumming echoing in the distance] They're stimulating, in a very positive way. [numerous frogs croaking] When you start to tune into the soundscape, you realize there's this other dimension to what we're experiencing when we're out here. [humming of wings] [murmuring water] [descending scale of canyon wren] [broken series of whistled notes] [crack and rumble of echoing thunder] [cricket sounds with occasional owl screeches] [hiss of waves crashing on shore] MAN: From the very first time that I took a microphone and a stereo recorder into the field it completely changed my life. Every time I turn on my recorder and I go into the field, it doesn't matter what the habitat is I discover something new. and I've been doing this now for almost 50 years. [bees buzz and birds call] It's all magical and informative and engaging and life affirming. [sweet series of whistled notes] and it gives us a sense of awareness of our connection to the living world. [ethereal flute notes of a hermit thrush] Every study that's been done indicates that even when we're unconscious of it, even when we deny it, that the stress levels, heart rate, blood pressure, all of those indicators are elevated when we're in the presence of noise. [rapid hammering of jackhammer] [pounding of pile driver] [blasting train horn] [ringing bells, traffic sounds] Karyn: When we live in cities, which most of us do, we have tuned out. We have to to survive. We stop hearing sounds. [low note of foghorn] So people come here and they only hear things in about a 10-foot radius around them and they completely have to learn how to start hearing beyond. [birds calling, squirrels chirping, woodpecker drumming] Maybe you don't know what it is, maybe you don't know what it's telling you, but you have begun to recognize that there are a multitude of different sounds happening around you. [busy rustle of aspen leaves] [gurgling water] [crack of loud thunder and rumbling echo] [splashing water] Bernie: During the process of working with the National Park Service on the soundscape program, my colleagues Stewart Guage came up with the idea of trying to identify the sources of sound, the three components of the soundscape, one being the geophony, or the natural sounds that we hear that are non-biological, like wind in the trees or water in a stream. [faint roar of waterfall] [thundering waterfall] [roaring waterfall] Karyn: When you come to Yosemite and you hear the waterfalls, it's all-encompassing, this rage of water. [water cracking on rocks] [burbling brook] Ssometimes you come across a tiny little cascade that's just adding dimension to all of the sounds that you're hearing in the soundscape. [splattering trickle of water] [very loud drumming] [tearing sound of wood] [buzzing bee] Karyn: We can hear birds singing right now, we get into the biophony. That's the biological sounds. So birds are singing. [load clanging notes followed by trill] the ground squirrel is doing its terrestrial alarm call, letting you know somebody is coming by on the earth. [harsh chirping] [people shouting, splashing loudly] Bernie: I save a special category for humans which we call anthropophony. All of the sounds humans generate, like those which are controlled, like music and theater and language and those that are not controlled, which we call noise. [rumbling motorcycles] Karyn: The idea that the soundscape is a value worth protecting is really a new idea in the Park Service, and how do we do that? So some people question the backing up beeping sound of a vehicle or the flyover traffic of a helicopter. What does the soundscape sound like in a healthy Yosemite landscape? [bird calls, wind] [harsh caw of Clark's nutcrackers] Karyn: It's important that visitors have an experience of the soundscape, so it's great that we are making efforts to protect that experience that is very valuable to the visitor even though they might not be thinking about it but if they came and didn't hear the bird songs, and they didn't hear the squirrel, and they didn't hear the water, there would be something missing. [clear notes followed by trill] [croaking frogs] [several spotted owls calling and hooting]