The Red Kite Feeding Centre, Llanddeusant, Brecon Beacons, Carmarthenshire, Wales, United Kingdom
See Red Kites feeding within the spectacular natural surroundings of the Brecon Beacons National Park, Wales
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Digital field guides for the iPhone
If you enjoy birdwatching, you may be pleased to learn that there are now digital field guides available for mobile phones such as the iPhone, available from Vodafone in the UK. These are essentially similar to book based field guides, with a few extra features, such as audio clips of birdsong and search functions. There are several field guides available for the iPhone, most of them based upon existing field guide books. Here are a few of the best:
Audubon Birds
This app uses photographs rather than illustrations for each bird. It is fairly comprehensive, and includes most of the information about each bird in its database that you might find in a standard field guide. The search engine is fairly intuitive and powerful, allowing you to search for birds based on a number of key characteristics.
IBird Explorer
This excellent digital field guide goes above and beyond most field guides in terms of the amount of information stored about each bird. There are paintings as well as photographs of each bird, which can be handy if you are struggling to pinpoint a particular species. Also, the search engine is one of the best in this round-up, as it allows you to search based on no less than 33 different criteria.
National Geographic’s Handheld Birds
This is pretty much a straightforward port of the National Geographic field guide, with the addition of a search function, audio clips, and additional textual information. However, it is a little let down by the navigation and search functions, which are better implemented elsewhere.
Peterson iPhone Bird Field Guide
This is not one app but a series of them. While this can be handy if you are only looking for one particular group of birds, such as raptors, warblers, or backyard birds, most birdwatchers would be better off with a single, comprehensive app that includes all the birds found in a particular region.
The Sibley eGuide to the Birds of North America
This is based on both the huge Sibley Guide to the Birds of North America and the smaller regional editions. It is a shame that they do not make a European version, but if you should find yourself birdwatching across the pond, then this is the guide to have, as it includes all of the illustrations from the big book and all the maps and text from the smaller guides. The search function is not as good as the one on iBird, but the comprehensive listings and the collection of bird noises more than make up for it.