Virtual vs. Real Mist Netting

Anyone who has sat beside a mist net knows that most bats that approach the net avoid it, and many others just fly by out of its reach. What bats are those? Well, those bats may avoid the net, but they don't avoid emitting echolcation calls that you can automatically record with a bat detector and analyze using SonoBat.

Certainly there are reasons to capture bats, e.g., to attach radio tags for tracking. But for a goal of species presence, digital mist netting offers an easier and typically more effective solution.

Longer term recording arrangements are possible with higher capacity units such as the iriver H320. These and other recording units can be configured using Rockbox open source firmware to record at specified times, autotrigger, write files with a date and time stamp, and record using lossless data formats.

These PowerPoint presentations provides complete instructions for iriver AutoRecording and file management.

The SonoBat Batch Attributer utility can attach notes, attributes, and site-specific filenames to your AutoRecorded files.

Although ideal for wildlife recording, iriver no longer produces the IFP series units. However, they can still be purchased through outlets such as ebay. Newer models limit recording capability, most likely over concerns regarding music copyright infringement. Other digital recording products to consider include the Samson Zoom H2 and the Edirol R-1. See the AutoParser and AutoRecorder pages to use other recorders.

See also the answer on the FAQ page about a weatherproof enclosure for long term recording.