This article was conceived and started (and scribbled on the back of my topo map) on a four day backpack trip to the Sisquoc River in northern Santa Barbara County. With no cell phone service — heck, we didn't even know what time it was for four days — and none of the other distractions of our modern lifestyles, one can become attuned to the sounds nature.
I was sitting around the fire on the second night with my good friend Nick. He is a raptor biologist and was regaling me with tales of holding Golden Eagles, Peregrine Falcons, and even California Condors in his hands, when he commented that "it would be a sad world without the cacophony of bird sounds around us." We were cooking dinner and slowly working on shedding the extra weight in our flask of sipping whiskey, and I had to heartily agree.
At sunset, several Common Poorwills started their incessant, high-pitched calling of their names from the distant hillsides. A Great-horned Owl gave a few tentative hoots, and then both male and females started calling back and forth, which lasted almost all night long. Barn Owls overhead gave their grating, screechy call, and also gave another odd call I don't recall ever hearing before, a loud, harsh clicking sound. I have since learned that is a bill-clapping noise, and some think it might even be tongue clicking.
Mixed in the bunch was my favorite owl call, the melodic tooting of the Western Screech Owl, starting slowly then quickening like a ping-pong ball coming to rest on a table. On the walk out, the single toots of the diurnal Pygmy Owl made it a four-owl weekend.
We were camped just yards from the river and the loud noises from several species of amphibians made for quite the background din. We often weren't even aware of how loud they were until they suddenly went silent, no doubt due to some perceived threat. The bravest of the Pacific Chorus Frogs would re-start his classic two part rib-bit call, followed by several hundred of his buddies. The pressure must be enormous to call in a mate, lay eggs, and have your progeny metamorphose before the brutal summer temperatures dry out most of the flowing waters of that backcountry.
Interspersed among them were the less common — at least in this area, — California Chorus Frog. Nick was able to pick out the call of the California Red-legged Frog, but we were unable to hear the call of the Arroyo Toad. These last two amphibians are dangerously close to extinction due to habitat loss and sadly may one day not be heard from again.
At first light, surprisingly, the first birds I heard were four woodpeckers working on pine trunks that were burned in a previous fire. The drumming rang out from the dead trees and could be heard for quite a distance. Somewhere downstream, a coyote was singing.
The dawn chorus included House Wrens and Song Sparrows, Purple Finch and Dark-eyed Junco. Two raucous woodpeckers, Acorn Woodpeckers and Northern Flicker, added their voices to the mix. Distant black birds cawed like crows, although I would have expected ravens instead in this drier portion of the county.
Some of the sounds I could have done without were the unknown mammals walking through camp, digging through the leaf litter, and one that seemed to be "drumming" on tree branches while I lay in my sleeping bag in the dead of night. Especially the last night I was there. Nick had to walk out a day earlier than I did, and alone at night, strange noises can be a little disconcerting.
I would advise anyone to take those earphones out of your ears, and put down the cell phone. Sadly, I feel there is a great disconnect with nature these days, but it's always out there just waiting for a listen.
