Nature Track

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1. A rainy night with owls beside a waterhole in the desert

   4 augustus 2026 · 1 uur 40 min

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   SOUNDS LIKE: The pressure release of rain drops hitting parched red sand after a sweltering day and possibly the best owl recording that Ann has ever taken. Lees meer

   CONTAINS: Patches of rain, and distant frogs happy with the rain, kingfishers with insomnia. And a spectacular territorial display from barking owls.

   RECOMMENDED FOR: Lovers of weather, of romance and whimsy, and also of birds-which-sound-like-they're-anything-but-birds enthusiasts.

   ANN'S NERDY SOUND NOTES:

   This is an incredibly dramatic place — and a special place in Yinjibarndi lore. It definitely has that gravitas. The water is surrounded in part by dark red, iron-filled cliff faces, cool grey-blue spinifex clumps and immense river red gums right at the water's edge.

   Even in the middle of the night, and even when it is raining enough to form puddles on the sand, the waterholes of arid Australia are centres of activity. So, although the landscape is all red sand and rocks, spinifex and heat haze, beside this spring-fed waterhole at Millstream Chichester National Park in the Pilbara in WA, it is pure, cool air.

   The water in this pool is so deep and cool that it gives you goosebumps if you jump in, even when it's 40 degrees in the shade.

   And the string of waterholes here are home to huge Pilbara Olive Pythons , which grow up to 4m long and can stay motionless for days on end waiting for the perfect meal to come too close. They can eat a whole rock wallaby in a sitting.

   Maybe they're the ones responsible for some of the quiet movements in this recording (which is, side note, possibly one of the most wonderfully surprising recordings I have ever taken).

   Not one, not two, not three but MORE nocturnal bird species all making themselves known between the rain patches. Magic.

   From the lands of the Ngarluma and Yindjibarndi people listen to raindrops hit dusty surfaces.

   00:00:00 Hear the rain pattering on the water, and the occasional 'tong' as a drop hits the microphone or a branch of the tree the micropho…

2. Soothing, soft wind through trees in a peaceful desert

   4 augustus 2026 · 2 uur 54 min

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   SOUNDS LIKE: Laying in a hammock, your eyes closed, no-one for 500km, surrounded by red sand, listening to the wind in trees that've been around since the dinosaurs. Perfect conditions for a nap. Lees meer

   Sometimes, you just need to a bit of silence. Of course, nature is rarely silent. She's even better than that. She's better than ANY noise machine a human has ever invented.

   Let the sound of wind through needle-leaves on Akerre Country lull your worries away.

   CONTAINS: Wind. Quiet. Zebra finches. Budgies. Mysterious rustling of small critters.

   RECOMMENDED FOR: Fans of gentle soundscapes and wind in sheoaks, those who don't want machine white noise but need to put a baby to sleep.

   ANN'S NERDY SOUND NOTES:

   I have a weatherproof recorder that I can stick out in almost any conditions and in this case I attached it to what has been called 'Australia's loneliest tree' in the Simpson Desert.

   To get there from Alice Springs, you travel through dune country, past ridges and through dry creek beds. And then all of a sudden a loose grove of skinny pine trees peak over the horizon. It is one of only two patches of Acacia peuce in the entire world. They're on opposite sides of the same desert and they're called lonely because they are solitary trees in an otherwise treeless landscape.

   It's also known as waddi waddi, or maybe Birdsville wattle and this stand is on Akerre Country.

   It is one of the rarest plants in the world and the wind through the needle-like leaves sounds gorgeous.

   This recording was taken while I was on site in the Simpson Desert, NT filming for Australia's Favourite Tree.

   We camped right near the Mac Clarke Reserve. And this is what I listened to all night.

   00:00 I'm not sure I've ever been anywhere in Australia where there wasn't a cricket calling.

   03:39 Zebra finches popular in aviaries worldwide but a native bird here in arid Australia, and for me they're one of the sounds that lets me know I'm somewhere arid.

   08:12 They sound like desert fairy wings…

3. Peaceful soundscape of soft ocean waves in a sandy bay

   4 augustus 2026 · 1 uur 16 min

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   SOUNDS LIKE: The 'shhhh' sound that tropical dreams are made of as gentle waves roll through mangrove trees on an island paradise. It's hushed and peaceful. Lees meer

   CONTAINS: Soft waves, and salt water moving quite continuously. Quiet insects throughout. The sounds occupy different frequencies and rhythms so they can all be heard clearly even when they're all calling. Listen for high pitched maraca-like single shakes, rickety-whirring phrases, tiny yaps marking a beat, or what sounds like a tiny mobile phone calling somewhere around 9khz.

   RECOMMENDED FOR: Fans of quiet white noise, waves and water sounds. Or those who like blocking out noisy colleagues by putting on outrageously large headphones and listening to the ocean instead.

   ANN'S NERDY SOUND NOTES:

   This place is White Lotus meets scientific research. At the Orpheus Island Research Station, the island is skirted by bright white sand, its steep hills covered in green vegetation, but rather than pleasure craft, it's practical research vessels anchored in the bay.

   Located in the Palm Islands on the southern end of the Great Barrier Reef, the Research Station is the sort of place that needs a dive shed (for all the gear), plus a fire pit (for evenings becoming mosquito food donors) and a wary eye (for the huge goanna that keeps on patrolling the shoreline).

   I was visiting to film for Dr Ann's Secret Lives: bull sharks.

   But this recording is not of the hectic process of catching a 200kg shark.

   Instead, this is from the mainland-facing side of Goolboodi, AKA Orpheus Island, in the sea country of the Manbarra people about 110km north of Townsville.

   The inlet is shallow, with a sweeping mudflat exposed at low tide, and epic mangrove trees around the edge. They're shaped like the 'tree of life' with roots spanning tens of metres and canopies to match, and the waves are forced to move through the roots, backwards and forwards, all night.

   The recorder is attached to one of those trees — and its roots split the waves i…

4. Nature's white noise — thousands of humming insects and a soothing rufous owl

   4 augustus 2026 · 2 uur 20 min

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   CONTAINS: A consistent insect chorus with a rufous owl calling intermittently throughout. Lees meer

   RECOMMENDED FOR: Those who like white noise, brown noise, pink noise. For people who want a consistent soundscape to help mask the sounds of the city, who want something almost mechanical or synthesised to help drown their thoughts.

   ANN'S NERDY SOUND NOTES:

   Subtle pulsations, and vibrations, with ticking, buzzing and swooshing that forms soft waves of white noise. It is the insect chorus in rainforest in Cape York, QLD.

   This recording was taken in the area under the care of Mapoon Aboriginal Council, next to a tidal river with mangroves in a patch of forest that is dense with life.

   There are crickets and katydids calling and probably a large range of other things that I'll never be able to identify.

   00:01:20 An orange-footed scrubfowl is calling in the distance.

   00:08:40 The clicks and snaps of movement. Also, of things falling from trees — perhaps discarded seeds by animals, leaves, or fruit.

   00:15:00 A brush cuckoo calling.

   00:15:50 The scream is a Tyto — either a Barn Owl or a Grass Owl. The calls are rather too similar to tell them apart.

   00:24:00 The metal 'sproing' call of a large-tailed nightjar — a bird which looks like leaf litter, but sounds like an industrial accident.

   00:33:45 The bounding thumps of a macropod.

   00:46:30 Now, at first I thought… frogmouth? What is that. But then I roped in my friend Dr Jodi Rowley, who then had to call in a second opinion. AND… drum roll — it is Litoria infrafrenata the white-lipped tree frog. Jodi says it's sort of unusual to hear its calls grouped together like that.

   00:53:30 An Eastern Koel calling. I wonder if they ever get any sleep. It seems that they turn up everywhere I record, no matter the time!

   00:55:30 That is the call of a rufous owl — a large nocturnal owl who looks a little like it is wearing a stripy 'Where's Wally' top in cream and orange. It also has a much milder resting 'expression' that the powerfu…

5. Birds in paradise — a rainforest nature soundscape from Australia

   4 augustus 2026 · 1 uur 30 min

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   SOUNDS LIKE: You're waking up while on holiday in a tropical rainforest, surrounded by exotic birds. Layers of sound are like vine tendrils curling through the jungle canopy: the birds are near, far, above and right next to you. Let them drown out whatever is giving you the sh*ts. Lees meer

   In reality, this place in Cape York isn't really visited by tourists. It's one of those spots that the locals from Mapoon Aboriginal Shire Council in Far North Queensland know about.

   CONTAINS: Mostly birbs. And a curious wallaroo later on.You'll hear green orioles, which sound like someone dropping PVC pipes, orange-footed scrubfowl which call out like an old lady (a posh one) getting a fright and even one of Australia's rarest birds, the palm cockatoo. Minimal flies and mozzies.

   RECOMMENDED FOR: Those who wish they could travel to every corner of the globe, for when you need something a bit louder to drown out some neighbours, or your thoughts. For bird people (and those who wish they were bird people).

   ANN'S NERDY SOUND NOTES:

   There is a 4WD track in western Cape York that leads from the highway towards a tidal river filled with crocs and sharks. Just as you're about to hit the high tide mark - that's where this recording is taken.

   It is 'riparian forest' which is the fancy way of saying it's forest on a riverbank. In this part of the world, it means thick vegetation with vines growing throughout, the foliage providing shade from the blasting sun, but also keeping the humidity high.

   There are rare (in Australia) Nypa Palms emerging from muddy water or even at the mangroves edge and let's face it, something that could bite you is never more than 30cm away.

   This is one of those recordings where there's so much going on, I almost don't know where to start when explaining what I can hear.

   00:00:00 A dawn chorus, though, if you listen very carefully there is a cross over of some nocturnal birds. The large-tailed nightjar sounds like a metal spring being repeatedly bounced. Boing boi…

6. A cold, crisp night, a high-country river and a whole lot of wombat

   4 augustus 2026 · 55 min

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   SOUNDS LIKE: You have eschewed modern life and joined your new BFF — a wombat — to live a life of naps, snacks and cute attacks. Lees meer

   CONTAINS: A clear, cold night and the wombats are stirring, stomping, scratching and most of all, crunching their way through about 2kgs of grass. Nearby, the wombat's neighbours undertake nocturnal shenanigans and no-one seems to get any sleep. Except you. There are birds which should be awake, birds which should be asleep, possums and the star of the show — the bare-nosed wombats.

   RECOMMENDED FOR: Explorers and the curious, those who want to feel awe and joy at discovering secrets that nature holds close to her chest.

   ANN'S NERDY SOUND NOTES:

   I didn't set out to record wombats. But when I went out one evening on Ngunnawal Country in the ACT, I stumbled upon an area that was almost as if it'd been exploded from below - there were holes and dirt EVERYWHERE.

   And I know a wombat poo when I see one -> 🟫 <-

   So, I found an active burrow entrance, with some grass nearby (that I thought could be quite delicious to a wombat) and attached the recorder at stumpy-little-hairy-leg height.

   The Murrumbidgee River is flowing about 10 metres away. Its banks are lined by big old eucalypts and a fair amount of scratchy vegetation (ask me how I know.)

   Bare-nosed (or common) wombats do lots of scratching. Lots of eating. A bit of bulldozing through things, maybe a fight. And that's just one night!

   00:01:30 Boobook calls. And in the distance, almost imperceptibly to the human ear in this recording, another answer.

   00:01:50 A micro bat flies past - you can hear a series of extremely high pitched 'pips' that doppler.

   00:03:10 A bat feeding buzz - the echo location calls are much, much closer together as it zeros in on its prey. And no, I have no idea what the wood ducks are going on about.

   00:04:08 Wood ducks like to roost in trees, nest in hollows, and sometimes, make noises like cats. You can hear the ducks roosting in different parts across the r…

7. Where there is water

   20 september 2022

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   No music. No voices. Just the sound of a creek bed in outback Australia. Lees meer

   In the Murchison district in Western Australia you're surrounded by low lying ranges where rocks have been found that are 4.4 billion years old — they're almost as ancient as the planet itself.

   Among the crests and dips of Wajarri country is a creek bed on Boolardy Station. Not flowing, but water is still there. And the places where there is water in this arid environment – well, it's a mecca for birdlife.

   Listen for: chiming wedgebills, lots of flies and other insects, rainbow bee-eaters, crested bellbirds, babblers and diamond doves among many many more.

   Mix Engineer: Isabella Tropiano.

   This program is produced on the land of the Wathawurung people.

8. The storm front

   13 september 2022

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   No music, no human voices. Just the sound of an epic summer storm rolling on through the evening. Lees meer

   I recorded this at my home. It had been a hot day, and in the late afternoon there was a crack of thunder. I walked out, set the recorder near the woodpile and recorded into the night.

   In this recording you can hear rain falling, hitting the earth and also hitting the microphones. And you can hear lots and lots of thunder.

   At first, the afternoon and evening chorus continues, but as the storm intensifies, just the cockies scream. Then, as darkness falls, insects take up the lulls between thunder and rain.

   Mix Engineer: Isabella Tropiano.

   This program is produced on the land of the Wathawurung people.

9. Sounds like camping

   5 september 2022

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   No music, no human voices, just the sound of night falling over bushland near Narrabri, recorded by the ABC's Ann Jones. It sounds like camping. Lees meer

   Narrabri is in North West NSW, in an incredibly fertile farming area. And yep, you guessed it, where it's fertile, it means you won't get much bushland left intact.

   This bushland is a patch on the Llara Farm which is used by the University of Sydney for research. I was lucky enough to travel there to film a program about technology and nature for 'Catalyst' on ABC TV.

   This recording differs a little from some of the others I've made for Nature Track. For example, there is no way that I can completely remove the distant sound of highway movement, of the endless trucks ferrying agricultural products towards the city.

   But this is an incredibly endearing mix of the insect chorus for me. It sounds like camping.

   A chorus of ravens in the distance, along with cockies going to sleep, and some sounds I cannot identify kick off this most relaxing soundscape yet.

   Listening notes from Ann Jones:

   00:00:45 I have no idea what this insect is, but I love it.

   00:10:20 I think this is actually a boobook – they make this sound when they're close to another boobook, rather than calling across a distance.

   00:30:35 One of the many sounds produced by foxes. They have a really wide vocabulary and can sound human-like, bird-like and just plain scary in the night.

   00:41:00 A bat circles past on its nightly food run echo-locating for both navigation and prey detection.

   00:46:30 A sneaky dog. I can't tell you how much time I spend pulling dogs out of nature recordings. They're almost ubiquitous in Australian landscapes

   00:58:40 I can hear a frog here, that's sounds a bit like a ruler twanged against a school desk. I think it might be a spotted marsh frog – Limnodynastes tasmaniensis.

   01:12:00 A distant boobook, the smallest owl in Australia, along with some fox calls and bat flybys.

   01:21:00 The terrifying scream of a barn owl. Yes, the…

10. Quiet shoreline at sunset

    29 augustus 2022

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    No music. No voices. Just the sound of a quiet ocean inlet in the early evening, recorded by the ABC's Dr Ann Jones. This shoreline is home to many wallabies; will they make any sound? Lees meer

    This was recorded over the summer of 2021/22 as I was spending time on Phillip Island / Millowl in Victoria, filming for 'Meet the Penguins' on ABC TV. I put the recorder out at Rhyll Inlet as the sun is setting. It's been a hot day and the cicadas are calling. Rhyll Inlet is a mixture of saltmarsh, mudflats, mangroves and some scrubby bits too. Slightly uphill, away from the water, there are grassy areas where wallabies abound. This is where the recording is taken.

    Listening notes from Ann Jones:

    00:00:39 Lower toned repeating call given in a short burst is the white-eared honeyeater. This bird is striking. It's somewhere between green and yellow, with a black face and a blob of white right behind its eye.

    00:02:20 This is still that same honeyeater.

    00:02:35 Eastern rosellas – gorgeous birds and I can just imagine their tails fanning and shaking as they speak with each other.

    00:03:40 The kookaburras are joining the chorus – announcing to one and all how strong they are as a family, and how well defended their territory is.

    00:06:08 MAGPIES! This chorus gets better and better.

    00:07:38 The gorgeous clear flute-like quality gives this away as a grey shrike thrush. Followed closely by a masked lapwing. Phillip Island is a hot spot for masked lapwings, which like to rest on the ground. So, the fox-free island means they have good numbers.

    00:09:02 The red wattlebird sounds as if it's the shutter mechanism on a giant, broken camera.

    00:10:50 The first incursion of a cape barren goose into the recording.

    00:18:12 This is a wallaby moving, they sometimes thump down with surprising force.

    00:18:40 …and there it goes.

    00:21:45 The GST is really giving a fantastic performance.

    00:22:06 It wouldn't surprise me if this is a swamp wallaby snapping a stick to eat. They're voraciou…

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