Appletell review – British Birds Video Guide for iPhone and iPod touch

Bird watching is one of the areas where the iPhone and iPod touch are generating a lot of excitement. After all, the big challenge of birding is identifying what you’re looking at by subtle marks and colors that can change not only with the season, but with the age of the bird. And, until recently, the only way to answer that definitively was by lugging around a heavy field guide against which to check your observations. Some companies, however, have developed programs for PDAs and even playlist generators for the iPod to make things easier for birders.

But now we have the iPhone, a device which combines photos (for checking identification), video (showing the bird’s actions in the environment), audio (bird calls), as well as email, phone, and web access (for keeping up to date on rare birds found in your area). A few American companies are starting to take advantage of the iPhone/iPod touch, but one place where they’re barreling ahead is the U.K., where BirdGuides has just released the British Birds Video Guide, iPhone and iPod touch Edition (BBVG).