The sounds of chatty Eurasian magpies - Pica pica.
When winter arrives in the Carpathian mountains, many birds choose to migrate south to escape the cold temperatures and heavy snow. Not the magpies though, they seem to enjoy and thrive in these arctic conditions. Now matter how low the mercury plummets, these hardy birds manage to overcome the hardship by foraging, scavenging and hunting for whatever will provide a little bit of nutrition.
Magpies are members of the crow family, and like their corvid cousins, they are believed to be some of the most intelligent non-human animals. They are one of the very few animals to have passed the mirror test. Magpies are very cool looking birds, with the black parts of their feathers exhibiting a blue, green or purple sheen. Their calls are not very melodious but rather harsh and scratchy. Adults have this well-known repetitive call that sounds a bit like chac-chac, easily heard and recognised.
This is one of the sounds of my childhood growing up in a rural part of Romania. When most other birds stop calling in late summer, magpies take over the soundscape. Through autumn and at the height of winter, it's mostly crows, jackdaws, ravens and magpies that can be heard in woodlands around villages.
I captured this recording on a winter trip by setting up a drop rig by the carcass of a red deer. I was hoping for mammal calls but they did not arrive. Well, at least I captured these beautiful magpie calls with soft frigid wind as the backdrop. Enjoy!
Recorded with Sony PCM A10 and Lom mikroUsi microphones. Enjoying the videos I upload on here? Please consider supporting me by:
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#birdsounds #birdsong #magpie
