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A LIFE IN SOUND
This series aims to take listeners on an epic and intimate journey through the natural world, all through the medium of sound and at the same time we want to enable a rare glimpse into the life of a man who recorded everything you’re about to hear, one sound at a time.
Martyn Stewart has spent his lifetime on a mission: to record the natural sounds of our planet. It’s a story that will take us from a council estate in Birmingham England and ultimately take him to every corner of the planet. From Belize to the Arctic Wildlife Refuge, from Denali to the Galapagos, to some of the most inhospitable locations geographically and politically. He will be attacked by lions and crocodiles, arrested in Japan for filming the annual dolphin slaughter and then find himself in long periods of isolation, in remote corners of the world waiting for 30 seconds of a that perfect sound. This is ultimately a love story – dedicated to our natural world and to the people who spend their lives aiming to give it a voice.
A LIFE IN SOUND
Galapagos Adventures: Wild at Heart
Six hundred miles off the coast of Ecuador in the open ocean, a volcanic archipelago straddles the equator. The Galapagos Islands, forged of black lava and named for the giant tortoises that are among their most noted inhabitants, are like no other place on Earth. Home to a profuse array of unique wildlife, the islands offer an immersion in nature that feels primeval. Iguanas and blue-footed boobies share the beaches with us, unfazed by our presence. Giant tortoises amble through our private camp, their golden eyes looking out from wizened faces. Inquisitive sea lions play with us in the clear turquoise water, as Galapagos penguins dart by and sea turtles glide past. Author Herman Melville, who visited the islands in 1841, shortly after Darwin's momentous visit, called them the "Enchanted Isles"—an apt moniker for a realm that remains otherworldly, even today.
Prepare to be transported to these breathtaking Islands as Martyn recounts his unforgettable 2019 adventure. In this episode, he shares his initial surprise at the bustling life on Santa Cruz and then quickly escapes to immerse himself in the diverse landscapes —from volcanic craters to serene mangrove forests of the remote and rugged Isabela Island.
Picture the exhilarating yet rough ferry ride that led to encounters with frigate birds, blue-footed boobies, sea lions, marine iguanas, and even Galapagos penguins. He vividly describes the island's lush mangroves, twisting vines, and pristine beaches that create a picture of an untouched paradise. Through personal anecdotes and observations, he paints a vibrant picture of the island's unique wildlife behaviors and captivating interactions.
Lastly, he reflects on the complex balance between conservation and tourism. His experiences navigating the crowded and commercialized areas of Santa Cruz contrast sharply with the untouched beauty of Isabella, raising important questions about the impact of human presence. Despite these challenges, his passion for responsible eco-tourism shines through. Tune in for a thought-provoking discussion on the importance of preserving the Galapagos' natural splendor for future generations, punctuated by personal challenges and moments of awe.
www.thelisteningplanet.com
This is Martin Stewart, with a life in sound from the Listening Planet.
Amanda Hill:Hello Martin. So today we're going to head over to the Pacific Ocean and to a group of volcanic islands and smaller islets renowned for their remarkable biodiversity and unique ecosystems. Islands and smaller islets renowned for their remarkable biodiversity and unique ecosystems. They're about 1 000 kilometers off the east coast of the coast of ecdor in south america. Where are we?
Martyn Stewart:we're in the galapagos okay.
Amanda Hill:So tell me, I'm desperate to go to the galapagos islands and I haven't yet been um, primarily actually because you have to be a certain age to be able to also dive in the galapagos. I think you have have to be 15, 16, and all this is an old man. So tell me first, when did you go, what year did you go to the Galapagos?
Martyn Stewart:2019,.
Amanda Hill:I think Okay, and where did you first land and tell me about.
Martyn Stewart:You land in the capital, ecuador, okay, and you get a plane out to an island I'm really crap at Spanish so you land there and all you know is you're not going to live on the island where you land. So you get this thing I hate called a boat and you get all your crap into the boat and they drop you off. It's only like 10, 15 minutes and then you go on to Santa Cruz, where it's like a little community, a lot of people. It was a real great shock when I saw the Galapagos, because people I'd spoken to years before saying how pristine it was and how protected it was and it wasn't the case, and when I saw all these people and bars and all that stuff, and at night time you've got bar noises and music and this is just one of these treasure chests in the whole of the world and we've got along and had a party there and to my mind, it was a huge big off-putt as soon as I saw that, was that just on the main island, though, does it?
Martyn Stewart:just on the main island, um, and of course they were talking about. There's a lot of people talking about conservation there and what they do with litter and rubbish and of course, inevitably you're going to find when people turn up to a place they're going to start disposing of rubbish, but it's such a treasure chest in a place of the world that is just unique. And when you know the story of Charles Darwin and what he discovered, you couldn't be closer to the truth with what he experienced, to what I experienced, but still amazing place. Couldn't be closer to the truth with what he experienced, to what I experienced, but still amazing place. Most of my, most of my life, I've been trying to sneak up on wildlife to record them. And then here you, you find that you can just walk up to them because they have no sense of fear, so it's kind of cool so let's start.
Amanda Hill:Let's start in santa cruz, and that's one of the main islands, right? So you've got the ferry over to santa cruz and I know that you get seasick, but now put the seasick bit to one side. You're there. What are the first? What does the island look like? I also know that the islands are very different some volcanic, some mangrove forests, some volcanic craters versus lots of vegetation. What is s Santa Cruz like? Tell me first what I'm seeing.
Martyn Stewart:There's various places where you can educate yourself on Santa Cruz. There's trails everywhere. You have to stick to the trails. You can't just wander off. And being me, you know, I want to move away from as many people as possible with my bag and my microphones and recorders. But where you can get to where people don't like to go is where you find me. And one of the first fascinating things that I discovered was the giant tortoises. And the tortoises are just incredible and they have a breeding program there.
Martyn Stewart:Whereas you know a lot of them, a lot of the old species became extinct, so there's a breeding program and you see different stages of their life there's there's a lot of a lot of pens and things where they're starting them up and they release them onto the islands, um, but I was able to have a few moments to record the hissing and stuff. And when you see these giant things, when you see some of the big ones, yeah, and reaching up you you see a lot of the fauna on the island is you see a lot of this sort of pontia, a lot of prickly pear, and you can tell where the tortoises go to because they have these such long necks. And as they're reaching up, you see about four feet of the bottom of the cactus just being eaten away. So the cactus is kind of standing there on its one leg going. You can't get this piece, but I found out that ET was modelled on one of these giant tortoises. I didn out that ET was modelled on one of these giant toys.
Martyn Stewart:I didn't know that.
Amanda Hill:When I first get to the island, to Santa Cruz, is there a soundscape that I hear? What's the whole soundscape feel like?
Martyn Stewart:Ocean, a lot of ocean, a lot of ocean sounds A lot of finches, a lot of the mockingbirds in the local areas which sing in a way, and then seabirds as well. I see a lot of seabirds. Waters are unbelievable, the waters are so clear, and yet I'm told that if you come in one particular time of the year, you can't see anything, which is a shame. So if you're going to go there I think it's between maybe november and may or something you're supposed to go there and that becomes nice and clear, so then you can see all the turtles swimming around and these amazing sea lions.
Amanda Hill:So and it's also. Isn't santa cruz also owned to the dar finches? I've got the Darwin finches, yeah.
Martyn Stewart:And they're in flocks you see a lot of these finches in flocks, so you get a lot of flock noises. There's a drone from Santa Cruz that is a people drone, which, as a recordist, it's a disappointment for me because I just want everyone to get off the island.
Amanda Hill:It's the first thing I want to do, and that's because Santa Cruz is just so populated. It's so populated. Is that what it is?
Martyn Stewart:But when you go there you have to. There is a deterrent in the form of people have to pay to go on because it is a national park, you know, and I think it's about $100 or something to go on because it is a national park, you know, and you, I think it's about a hundred dollars or something to go on and some people, you know, get put off for that. But there's also so many places where you can get tours and you have to have a guide with you. So I I had a guide with me and he turned his back a few times when I just go off the beaten track, but I my my objective was to go to Isabella.
Amanda Hill:I did Isabella as much as possible. We've left the hostel. Okay, so we leave the hostel and bustle of Santa Cruz, where there are other human beings, and we know that you're not particularly a fan of human beings, martin, so we go to Isabella. How do you get to Isabella? Didn't you get Caesar going to Isabella, isabella is horrible. The trip to Isabella.
Martyn Stewart:Isabella is horrible. The trip to Isabella. Isabella is beautiful, but Isabella to get there is horrible. You're in the beck and call of the powers that be and I'm always one of these guys who ends up staring at someone who's going to be sick or oh my god. And you're on the boat, in the ferry, and there's like a circle seat from top to bottom. You're facing various people and I'm not kidding you, the water is so rough when you're on the in the boat and I'm I'm the worst.
Martyn Stewart:I told you the story, I think, of the time I was in new zealand when I had to go and record on the South Island of Stewart Island and, to my dismay, the captain told me it was a four-hour trip on a boat. He told me that. I told him I was going to be sick and he said eat oranges. And I asked him if that worked and he said no, but they taste the same. Coming back up and I'm thinking when I'm going to Isabella, I wonder how long it's going to be before I'm sick. We stayed on Isabella for a couple of days. There's only about 1,500, 2,000 people on Isabella, so it's kind of cool and it's nice that way, but again, you're supposed to stay with the guide, but my objective was to get frigate birds and blue-fitted boobies, and when you see these characters they're like something out of the circus. They're just unbelievable.
Amanda Hill:The frigate birds, so blue-fitted boobies might be. Oh, the boobies are just spectacular. They're my favourite.
Martyn Stewart:And the blue is just beautiful.
Martyn Stewart:And I saw the dance. I saw the dance between male and female and they really do show off with each other. You know that dance going on the ones that were close to me I couldn't get any vocalizations because it's almost like a mime. It's just incredible. And then, a few feet away from them, there's a female on top of her eggs and no wildlife runs away. Nothing gets scared of you, so they've never been predated by anything. It's just like some kind of heaven that you're just blessed to be able to be in. It's just incredible.
Amanda Hill:So on, isabella, tell me what the vegetation is like there. Is it very different from Santa Cruz?
Martyn Stewart:Vegetation is a lot of mangrove, there's a lot of twisting vines. When you walk down the trails, there are thick, thick stems that hang over the place and you get that buzz of insects and you get birds that will come and place, and, and you get that buzz of insects and you, you get, you know, birds that will come and land and vocalize and do all that kind of stuff. It's um, it's a special place and of course my mind is to go into a place where nobody is, which I was able to do. But the beaches were just spectacular white sand and water as clear and that beautiful tropical, green, bluey, turquoise color. And then you know you can sit next to a sea lion, talk to him, you know he's just sitting, he's just taking in the sunshine and you have a couple of growls or whatever it's.
Amanda Hill:It's just spectacular so tell me who else I find on the beach. So I'm gonna find the sea lions. The giant tortoises are also on isabella. Did you see any of the marine iguanas?
Martyn Stewart:loads of marine iguanas. Okay, I dropped a hydrophone in the water. I didn't get much stuff, but they go into the water and then they're looking for sea algae and stuff and it's almost like this carpet just walks into the ocean and starts swimming around and then, of course, so many turtles. You see rays, you know, I saw a bunch of rays. I think that was probably coming into Santa Cruz, but it's almost like nature's zoo. You know everything's there. There's so much you've got to take in. You're almost saying, look at that, look at that, look at that, look at that, look at that, look at that. It's just, you know. You know what I'm like. I'm like a kid in a sweet shop.
Amanda Hill:Do you see the Galapagos penguins on Isabella.
Martyn Stewart:I saw the penguins on Isabella. I saw a flamingo on Isabella too. I didn't get much vocalisation from the flamingos. How do the penguins hang out? What are they like? Tell me about them. There's a bunch of individuals that I'd seen. I saw one penguin shooting around like a dart underwater, so quick and so fast and agile. Of course, I didn't get any vocalizations of them, which is always to a point. That's the reason why I'm always there, point. That's. That's the reason why I'm always there. But there was um from isabella, I think.
Martyn Stewart:We took a boat out to this rock area where there was seabirds, maybe something like plaza island or something which is not far from there. You just go out. Many times to my downfall is my inability to to be in a boat. You know, most, most of my stuff is recorded on land. I always, I always believe when, when the pope turns up to a country and he gets off the plane and he kisses the floor, he's not blessing the place he's just arrived in, he's just kissing the floor and saying thank god for terra firma, and that's how I feel all the time.
Amanda Hill:Who knew that you had such a fragile system, martin oh?
Martyn Stewart:it's terrible. A lot of pelagic birds are out of my list. I could, if I liked, boats a lot more. I think I'd have a lot more pelagic species.
Amanda Hill:So what else did you see? So talk to me about what like. What does the morning sound like in Isabella? What does the evening sound like? What am I hearing at different points in the day?
Martyn Stewart:You have that kind of 12 hours sunshine, 12 hours darkness. So you have these insect choruses which are pretty typical of Central South America or that equatorial zone. And when the sun goes down, you've got these beautiful choruses of cicada insects and in the morning you have that awakening Same thing with lots of Darwin finches and lots of mockingbirds, tropical kingbirds. You have birds that will fly over the top of you, some seabirds. It's just I'm not, you know, I'm not a birder.
Amanda Hill:So I know you tell us that all the time, but you've still recorded thousands of them I bet you, there's probably a lot of birds.
Martyn Stewart:I don't know what the hell they are. You know and I've not identified them to a point. So while I'm on the galapagos, there's no reference point as to what, what you're listening to. You just say there's a bird there. I haven't heard that before and you know I'm colorblind and I can't identify what I'm looking at we have a colorblind c6 sound recordist but there's.
Martyn Stewart:There was things like black, black necked stilts and blue-footed boobies. I had tons of recordings of blue-footed boobies there. There's brown pelicans, there's cactus finches, there's petrels, there's Darwin finches. Of course, there's dusky gulls. There's flightless cormorants which are on one of the main islands, llandina I think it is, but I was able to find some flightless? Um cormorants on isabella. There's um galapagos dusky gulls, fur seals, giant tortoises. There's galapagos hawks, there's the galapagos mockingbird um, there's a ton of shit like that, you know, which I've never encountered before, which is just beautiful when you went to the galapagos, tell me which of the species that you saw that you'd never seen anywhere before.
Amanda Hill:So the blue-footed booby is that.
Martyn Stewart:That was the star. That was the star, yeah, that was like going to Vegas and seeing Danny LaRue or what was the guy with the piano, liberace. It's almost like going in and someone's standing on the stage warming the audience up, and in on comes Liberace with his outfit on playing the piano. That's what the blue footed boob is like and do they have a good?
Amanda Hill:because I've only seen them dance lots, because I seem to put them in every single thing that I do. But what's their vocalisation like? Sounds like this ok, so you, you stay on Isabella, and then eventually, I think, you also make it over to San Cristobal.
Martyn Stewart:Yes, Cristobal.
Amanda Hill:So tell me what does that island look like Before we think about the sounds. And then I want to know what the soundscape is like when I get there.
Martyn Stewart:Cristobal, lots of frigate birds, lots of sea lions, lots of iguanas.
Amanda Hill:Is it still lush vegetation or is it more volcanic?
Martyn Stewart:It's lush vegetation and beautiful sands yeah, again, the ocean being gorgeous. And anywhere you go, your mate becomes a sea lion. You know you can see sea lions in bars, under staircases, under chairs, jumping into someone's boat and cap on, you know, and smoke a fag and they're just adorable and they're king. You know they're the king of the animals on the island, and get out of the way because I'm coming through. They tell you that you're supposed to stay six feet away from all the animals, but when you're walking down one of the trails, the seals and sea lions I've encountered around the world will take a swipe at you.
Martyn Stewart:You know, the ones that I've seen in the skeleton coast of Namibia, the ones I've seen down in New Zealand, the ones I've seen down in Patagonia, all of these ones. You don't want to be six feet in front of those, but these ones are just incredible. But the frigatebirds were one of the target species that I wanted to get to the vocalizations of the males they're kind of a bunch of show-offs. They're showing off because they they have to do that thing to get the woman. So you know, look at me and it's it's kind of, it's kind of romantic in. In a lot of ways the special one wins and gets the bird. There are frigate bird colonies that you, you can see and they're very vicious towards each other. They'll try and burst their bags, you know. Their vocal balloons are underneath their chins and they'll, they'll attack those and you can see some of the frigate birds with these rips in so they can't blow them up. But when they blow them up, have you ever sucked on one of those helium balloons, you know?
Martyn Stewart:and I was young so it's almost like that and they have this chatter and this conversation going on. It's just amazing. So I was very lucky to get, um, a lot of uh, a lot of frigatebird vocalizations and a lot of booby vocalizations, and then to me it didn't matter what else I got, everything was a bonus I still find it quite funny that a seasick man decided to go to the Galapagos, where everything's an island and you have to get a boat everywhere you go.
Amanda Hill:Did it not temper your enthusiasm for the travel?
Martyn Stewart:I'm always nervous about that stuff. If there's a boat involved, I'm always nervous. You know Roo would tell you that. Will you go on a cruise and go somewhere? No, thank you. No, I don't want to do it.
Amanda Hill:Tell me what's your. I ask you this quite a lot, but if you closed your eyes and you have to conjure up the scene so you can hear it, I know that if I placed you in a place, you could hear it and tell me where you are. Tell me what's in your mind when you're, when you, when you hear the galapagos. You can't see anything. You're switched off. What are you hearing?
Martyn Stewart:you're hearing distant sea lions. Certain times of the day they'll they'll be calling each other, um, you hear seabirds. You hear, um, the petrels which will be flying around the towns. The dawn is that kind of chatterbox time. There's a lot of bird sounds that are calling each other, but it doesn't have that effect like the mainland. It doesn't have that kind of cacophony of sounds where, if I'm being really honest with you, the negative part of seeing so many people, the shock of seeing so many people on the islands, gave me a negative kind of view and it it's that thing of me again that wants to protect.
Martyn Stewart:So I'm one of these type of people that when I enjoy an experience of nature I don't want to share it with people because I don't want them to go and I I want it to be a safe haven for animals. So when I, when I saw the Galapagos, when you go and see something and it lets you down, you don't kind of tell a lot of people how good it was, you tell on how negative it was yeah but there was a protective nature with me that that I think it's one of these places where you think here we go again.
Amanda Hill:Man is stuffing everything off but you feel that less when you went out, when you got away from santa cruz when I was on isabella.
Martyn Stewart:Yes, and san cristobal and san cristobal, but especially, especially isabella. There's so much of isabella, but especially, especially isabella.
Martyn Stewart:There's so much of isabella you can't get to yeah you just can't go, and I would love to be able to go there. I'd love to be able to one day just go there and be fit enough. So because it's quite a hike, I mean, you really do have to use a lot of your leg muscles to get around. You can't get an uber or a taxi, you can't do you know whatever. But I used to believe that you could only go to the galapagos and be on there and come back again to the mainland. I didn't know before I went. You know on this excursion that there were hotels and bars and restaurants and all this. I think what the hell? If you were to dig up Charles Darwin, you know, and say, look at this, this is 2024 or 2019. This is the Galapagos Islands, he would be horrified.
Amanda Hill:But so help me on, because the number of places I've been to where I've had that same experience. Even when I first went to Belize Martin, when I landed in the main city I couldn't get out fast enough, but the moment I was out it was one of the most beautiful places I've been to in the world.
Amanda Hill:We touched on that, didn't we, with belize and I feel city is like santa cruz but I really, when I got there, wondered why I was there, and the moment I left I couldn't get over how beautiful it was, and so for the I really want to go to the black and I get very nervous about leaving it till too late, because I do worry about the degradation and I worry about how protected it really is. But what you're basically saying is that first experience can be a bit of a shock, because you didn't expect that first experience.
Martyn Stewart:To a lot of people. It wouldn't be a shock To a lot of people. They would say this is wonderful.
Amanda Hill:No, I think it still would. I think In my head, until I spoke to you now, I had no idea. I honestly thought that people are out in boats and they took a limited number of people every year and it was really not built up. I mean, I have a very different image in my head of what I thought. But maybe what we're talking about is the further you get into the islands, but those main parts, our main parts, they're tourist destinations now.
Martyn Stewart:So you have to get off Santa Cruz to get out onto the islands to really experience what Galapagos is like all my life I've seen places where you know, even when I was born and I lived on a council estate, there was green belt that went on for miles and miles and the older I've got I've seen situations like that and seen how built up that we've become. And when you get to modern technology and you're able to do an aerial view of a place over a period of 20 years, it's such a shock yeah I mean when you see a map of the, the night sky of the world and the amount of lights that's everywhere it's.
Martyn Stewart:it's just that I, I think santa cruz, where we stayed, we were probably about 10, 15 minutes out of the town. I wanted to stay local, always just stay in the local area. I didn't want the tourism thing. So 10, 15 minutes away you didn't have the night booms of music going on and I was thinking what effect does that have on the environment over a period of time?
Martyn Stewart:The animals are not used to predation, you know, they're not scared of anything but, suddenly they've had to adjust to this thing, this rhythm in the night which is foreign to them yeah and how have that?
Martyn Stewart:how's that adjusted their life? So I, when you go to isabella and you go, there's one particular trail. You go down and you come to the end and the beach. It's a very long walk and when you look across the bay, there are parts of Isabella that are not accessible and I want it to stay like that. And if it meant that I couldn't go, I'm happy with that, because if I can't go, nobody else can go. So I'm thinking we could just designate that little bit of land for the animals and stop pushing ourselves out and down down the animals throats.
Martyn Stewart:It's an experience of joy, it's an experience of sadness all in one for me, because it's such a special place yeah you know you, you only ever talked about the Galapagos as being this unique environment, and then it's almost like you were told a lie yeah and I know that sounds negative, but I'm very protective of natural lands, but it's not.
Amanda Hill:I think what you're saying is really important in terms of more than most places in the world. They do an immense amount of work for conservation and to protect it as a national park. But tourism we talked about this in costa rica, martin, a couple of podcasts ago it just we can't help ourselves but become the invasive species. We talk about them, protecting them from other invasive species, but the human ends up being the invasive species and we end up dominating the environment, and it's always that. And they do an incredible job of also limiting the number of people that are allowed to go out into the islands, and so they're doing a really good job of it. But for someone like you, it's still in the main areas and it's just the main areas. It's still. It's overwhelming. It's not what you'd expect. It's true, it's not what you'd expect. Let's turn to um. If you're going to go back, I always ask you this I'd go back.
Martyn Stewart:I'd like to be able to take as much ginger as possible to stop my seasickness and go and look at some other different islands around here and hire a boat, you know, and try and get onto many of these places as possible. Just to just to record. I'd like to um, I'd like to explore Isabella more and I'd like to go back a different time of the year because, having known the best time of year was between November and May, I'd like to probably go May to September when nobody else is there when there's nobody there, but but then you don't see as much of the stuff in the ocean itself, which is fine with me, because I listen, I see through my sound, you know if you can I ask you a question, martin?
Amanda Hill:so you drop the, you drop your microphone into the ocean. I'm beginning to you. Know, everyone who's listening to this thinks I should know this about you. Know everyone who's listening to this thinks I should know this about you. But clearly your seasickness is a very dominant part of this particular podcast. So how does that mean that you're capturing sounds underwater, because I know you've got lots of the ocean sounds? Do you stay away from the seabirds that are too far off land? What about the uh creatures underwater? Rue would be listening.
Martyn Stewart:Rue would listen to this thing we we did, um one of the first things that we did, together with water involved, we went to your dad's wedding on the cayman islands and for the wedding present we bought them a dive.
Amanda Hill:Yeah.
Martyn Stewart:And holy shit did I suffer for that. So Rue is a professional diver, she has a PADI certificate and all that, and she was able to take me on a resort dive. We went out and stuffed my luck, the boat that we went out on. They were looking for a diver that had been lost and obviously died. And this was in my head and they're telling me what I'm supposed to do when I get in the water and how I should breathe and how I should wet my mask and I should do this.
Martyn Stewart:But I went into the water, they took me real, took me down how many feet, god knows how many meters or whatever, and I was absolutely ill and I was trying to get to the top to be sick and as soon as I was sick, all these fish came in, ate everything that I bellowed up and I told her I can't do boats, I just can't do boats. So if I get on a boat to do a hydrophone thing, I've got to go out, I've got to stop the boat, I've got to drop it as quick as possible, record as quickly as I can and get the hell back to shore. It's just that way. I just can't help it.
Martyn Stewart:You know, the beach, across the road, we have turtles laying their eggs between May and September and it's just an incredible experience. You see Same turtles which are down in the Galapagos. We've got loggerheads and green turtles and leatherbacks and Ridley's turtles. I took my canoe I own a canoe right.
Amanda Hill:I own a bloody canoe, just staggering, staggering.
Martyn Stewart:And I was talking to the um, the university of florida, who regulate and and document all the turtle nests that come in every day, and they told me that green turtles don't vocalize. And I said I'm sure they do and they said no, there was no recollection of any vocalizations. So I got my canoe, carried it across the road, took my recorder and hydrophone, got onto the boat, got past the riptide, went out into the ocean, dropped the hydrophone into the water. I could hear these pulses going on and the closer I got to these green turtles they were vocalizing. So I got it, got ashore, spewed up, took, took the recording to the university of florida and said there's a green turtle what did they say?
Amanda Hill:it's the one. I'm very proud of you for your stubbornness it was unbelievable.
Martyn Stewart:They couldn't believe it that's amazing they couldn't believe it. They said it are you sure it's something, not something else? And I said no, it's definitely these green turtles, as they were mating on top of each other and it's that. So I don't know what's going on in the ocean. You know, you can't see. It's like recording bats at night.
Amanda Hill:Especially if you won't go under it, martin, I won't go under.
Martyn Stewart:That's called drowning, Mandy.
Amanda Hill:So we will on the next podcast. We have to pick a place that is particularly a dry land place, I think, and not surrounded by water is the biggest.
Martyn Stewart:Yeah, let's do terra firma.
Amanda Hill:Yeah, I think we'll close it there.
Martyn Stewart:You've just experienced another journey on the listening planet podcast. Dive deeper into the world of natural sounds by connecting with us online. Visit our website or follow us on social media. Let the symphony of nature surround you wherever you go. Happy listening.
