I went out in the early evening to find a good spot to record the sounds of the red deer rutting. I was in Martindale Forest, a beautiful old oak woodland on the side of a steep fell. I could hear the deer, but they were too far away for clear recording.
Instead the birds were quite vocal, and in this recording you can hear some long-tailed tits (listen for a very high frequency call), as well as some crows, ravens and other birds as the sun set. In the distant background the red deer can be hear bellowing away.
After it got dark I walked back to Martindale church where I had left my car. I hadn’t thought about how hard it would be in the dark to navigate the narrow steep track through the bracken; even with a head torch on.
amissio 