Birds in Sydney Gardens — a podcast
Lucy Starling writes about her experience of making a new podcast about bird song in 2021
I have hosted nature walks, with the emphasis on bird song, for Friends of Sydney Gardens and Henrietta Park in recent years.
As part of the National Lottery Heritage Funded enhancement of Sydney Gardens, Sue Palmer, the project’s Community Ranger, invited me to create a podcast in the gardens about bird song and the importance of parks in towns and cities as places for nature.
As I had recently come to know Gary Moore, a freelance sound recordist living in Bath whose work includes features for the Spring/Autumn/Winter Watch series, I suggested he would be the ideal person to assist us, in particular, as a very keen bird listener. Gary and I had a short run through a week before the recording date of 21st April, which was going to be difficult for Gary as the site, even at around 5am, had noisy passing traffic and trains and, at the time, less of a pleasant green space, but more of a building site, as the park is undergoing the restoration and construction phase!
The early morning time slot for the recording was dry but rather cold for the end of April. We met about 5.45am and initially stood near the Great Western railway line having heard a Dunnock, Greenfinch and Wren. Gary had previously recorded Blackbird, Song Thrush and Nuthatch. This was not going to be easy and I must admit I was quite nervous and anxious.
It took me a while to settle in and we had to do a couple of takes on some question and answer sequences. I certainly was not as relaxed as standing in front of Bath Nats members hosting an indoor bird song workshop or leading a field meeting! The pressure was on to get the task done there and then. We had to pause recording for passing trains and a motorbike so the flow of conversation between Sue and myself was often disrupted and if either of us fluffed our words, we started again. When we had what we needed for about a 20 minutes broadcast, I was very relieved and quite mentally exhausted. At the end of the session, Gary managed to get close to a Wren belting it out from cover near the little gate leading onto the canal towpath, with the day ahead to edit and come up with the finished product fit for broadcasting.
Sue sent me a personal link to listen, via Soundcloud, which I had never heard of before. Gary thought the end product was good. Sue was very enthusiastic about it. Well, I was a little more critical of my performance and as Gary assured me, nobody likes the sound of their own voice in these circumstances. I listened and cringed a bit — once was enough. I had no idea what the reaction would be and who would tune in. The response was surprisingly favourable! I am out there on social media — Facebook and Twitter with quite a number of likes. I was then totally amazed when Sue informed me that The Festival of Nature local event organised by The Natural History Consortium in liaison with BANES, one of its fifteen partners, wished to do a short film interview with me in Sydney Gardens talking about birds in parks and green spaces and how these can attract wildlife. This filming took place on 25th May, and you can see the film here. The event, normally taking place in Bath and other venues around the middle of June, would all be on line this year.
Thankfully, it was a dry and sunny morning but becoming increasingly breezy and cloudy. I was more prepared this time although some questions were similar to those in the podcast, it was more relaxed, I fluffed the odd word then corrected myself and no re-takes needed. Of course, it was stop-start again due to passing trains and sirens! And following that, to cap it all, I found myself on a flyer on the RSPB stand in Sydney Gardens promoting Nature on your Doorstep in June and July. Compiling the two Bath Nats nature walks, the podcast and filming, has been an ideal opportunity to promote Bath Natural History Society and Bath and District RSPB Members’ Group. What next for me I wonder!?
Listen to the Bird Song in Sydney Gardens Bath podcast
Lucy Starling
