No outdoor ground plane measurements this month, not in my region of North America... It is cicada season https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Periodical_cicadas, and 10 million of these loud little buggers per acre makes for some loud ambient background. This afternoon, I measured 86 dBA continuous in my back yard. It is an octave wide band going from 4k to 8k... very annoying. The only way to escape it is to drive several hundred miles...
So I am wondering about other parts of the world... what sort of natural phenomenon creates high ambient noise levels in South America, Europe, regions of Asia, Australia, Africa, etc... j.
So I am wondering about other parts of the world... what sort of natural phenomenon creates high ambient noise levels in South America, Europe, regions of Asia, Australia, Africa, etc... j.
The loudest sounds made by living beings over here are probably human children screaming like crazy. They don't do that continuously, fortunately.
Regarding insects, we also have cicadas and grasshoppers, but not in huge numbers and they only make sound on hot days. I also rather like the sound.
Regarding insects, we also have cicadas and grasshoppers, but not in huge numbers and they only make sound on hot days. I also rather like the sound.
Years ago in Albuquerque, New Mexico, doing sound for an outdoor jazz concert "woke up" cicadas in a tree just behind my mix location, about 25 meters from the stage.
I had to cut all the upper frequencies from the the drum overhead mics, the cicadas were louder (from 25 meters away!) than the cymbals
.Once the cicadas started "singing", acoustic instruments could hardly compete. Looking at an RTA display, only a few musical peaks would emerge above their continuous high frequency screech. The electric piano and bass were unaffected, and the band's horns were louder at their mics, but overall the cicadas completely upstaged the show, and any conversations during the band's break time.
The next morning setting up sound about 60 miles north, thought I heard the first cicada emerging there, but it turned out to be only a rattlesnake under the stage.
"Brave Dave" dispatched the rattler with a pocket knife, can't do that with a thousand (or a million) cicadas..
A week or so after that, woke up thinking my tinnitus centered at 4kHz had worsened, turned out some cicadas had emerged about 100 meters up the arroyo.
No cicadas here this year.
Frequency sweep tests seem to make dogs, birds and crickets want to join the chorus, but pink noise not as much.
Using pink noise, wind noise has usually been the loudest competition.
Art
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I don't make videos, but this guy made a nice short one... He also measured 86 dBA outdoors in open space....
We get this every 13 years and 17 years... The last time we had it was before I started doing measurements. I was not anticipating how much this would impact measurements. Even in my normally quiet house, the noise floor has risen from 36 dBA to 49 dBA.
We get this every 13 years and 17 years... The last time we had it was before I started doing measurements. I was not anticipating how much this would impact measurements. Even in my normally quiet house, the noise floor has risen from 36 dBA to 49 dBA.
Well, on the other hand, continues non coherent noise can be averaged away.
Probably even a bit more with some auto/cross correlation techniques.
But you have to do a whole lot of averaging to get a decent noise floor lol
This year is told to be extraordinary to the normal single occurring 13 or 17 year cycle brood as both are now synced in a rare emerging double brood which hasn't happened since the year 1803, fascinating phenomenon.
https://www.nbcnews.com/science/sci...e-periodical-brood-2024-map-cicada-rcna134152
https://www.nbcnews.com/science/sci...e-periodical-brood-2024-map-cicada-rcna134152
Commiserations to you Jim. I’ve experienced exactly what you’ve experienced. It is horrible. You can’t enjoy your hi-fi, or anything else in for that matter during this time tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick 85 to 90 DB is what I measured.
Here where currently live (Northern Australia) The sound comes from the trees. But people live in elevated homes built for the tropical regions - built prior to the advent of HVAC. Feels like it’s all around you- it feels like you are in amongst the sounds and there’s no escape. It’s very oppressive.
I had to break the lease and move after 6 months. I wasn’t going to tolerate that, in conjunction with 90F maximum temperature every day of the year, humidity between 60 and 80%, and have no effective AC.
A total First World problem, I know. But these days I only have crickets affecting the noise floor -> distortion of my measurements.
7KHz, ~35dB, to be precise, and only at night…
Here where currently live (Northern Australia) The sound comes from the trees. But people live in elevated homes built for the tropical regions - built prior to the advent of HVAC. Feels like it’s all around you- it feels like you are in amongst the sounds and there’s no escape. It’s very oppressive.
I had to break the lease and move after 6 months. I wasn’t going to tolerate that, in conjunction with 90F maximum temperature every day of the year, humidity between 60 and 80%, and have no effective AC.
A total First World problem, I know. But these days I only have crickets affecting the noise floor -> distortion of my measurements.
7KHz, ~35dB, to be precise, and only at night…
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