iphone digital field guides

[Malcolm Fraser]

Hello all,

I'm wondering if anyone out there finds the digital field guides for iphone any use?

I've used Chirp! and Birds UK on my ipod touch and, although they only have common species, I've found them both to be useful. Birds UK is possibly a bit better due to having more photos for each species.

The only digital field guide that I'm aware of which seems to be as good as a reference book is the Butterflies of Britain and Ireland.

Does anyone know of any other good apps?

What other apps would you like to see? I'd love to have a good digital version of Francis Rose's Wild Flower Key!

I'd also love an app specifically for wildlife recording...

[tom00_uk]

i use the net from the iphone to check an id

you can at least take a back up snap on the iphone and then know where using a real camera where you were using the location data

[Boddie]

I use Birds UK and this week bought the Butterflies of Britain and Ireland. At a tenner it is not cheap but it is an excellent app and Lewingtons photos and drawn images are just what you would expect.

It shows

Male and female upper and under
Male feeding
Female laying eggs
Adult Basking
Adult at rest
Hibernating cocoons
Larva
Egg
Pupa
Antenna
Distribution (UK)
Phenogram and
Info

etc

[muscardinus]

There's going to be a brief review of two BirdGuides iPhone apps in the February issue of BBC Wildlife (this issue is not on sale until 21 January).

I have a sneaking suspicion that this type of interactive ID guide will, in say 5 years' time, be commonplace on many people's mobile phones. A device with GPS would potentially be able to tell you if you were within the range of a particular species, for example.

[Malcolm Fraser]

Originally Posted by muscardinus

I have a sneaking suspicion that this type of interactive ID guide will, in say 5 years' time, be commonplace on many people's mobile phones.

I agree, I think when new field guide books are being produced it's probably not too much work to adapt them for digital platforms like the iphone.

I'm halfway inclined to learn how to write iphone applications myself.

I'll keep an eye out for that review in BBC Wildlife

[Richard G.]

New Birdguides iphone/touch app launched today, looks pretty good and doesn't cost the earth, any takers want to provide feedback?

[Boddie]

In my opinion its excellent. Not cheap but worth it for the excellent illustrations and images. Extensively better than any of the other birding guides out there, which I regret getting having now got this one.

Should add its a big file by the way. May be better downloaded from Itunes than over 3G

[Boddie]

Also, in my opinion there are much better images on this site than on this application so it may be worth some of our togs submitting images for inclusion.

The Producer is Fiona Barclay
Sotware, interface, design and integration is by John Cromie at www.skylark.ie
Executive producer is Max Whitby

The illustartions are great but some of the photos can be bettered by what guys have submitted to WAB

[Richard G.]

Interesting stuff Boddie, thanks for the quick feedback

[Boddie]

If someone wants to test me with a bird I will give you all of the info from the guide. Apparently there are 271 or so on here so I welcome a quick test