Explore safely

Songtrail is a game about getting outside, which means it sends you to real places. This page is what we'd tell a friend before handing them the app.

Nearby pins are a guess about your area

The Explore map shows which species are statistically likely around you, drawn from open occurrence data and spread as pins near your current location. Those pins are a hint about the area. There's no bird waiting at that exact coordinate, nobody has checked the ground underneath it, and a pin can land on private land, open water, a road, or terrain you can't safely reach.

The same goes for the chase line joining your recent finds. It connects places you've already been, and isn't a suggested route. Songtrail doesn't do routing, and it doesn't know what's between you and anywhere it shows you.

Before you head out

Birding outdoors carries the ordinary risks of being outdoors, and you're the one deciding where to go and whether it's safe to go there. The app has no idea.

• Check the weather, tides, terrain and daylight before you set out, and turn back when conditions change.
• Stay aware of your surroundings. Don't use the app while driving, cycling, or crossing a road.
• To reach a find, don't head into unfamiliar or hazardous ground: water, cliffs, marshland, quarries, or anywhere unlit.
• Tell someone where you're going when you head somewhere remote, and don't rely on your phone as your only way back.
• Songtrail is made for all ages. Younger birders should explore with an adult.

Where you can go

A pin on the map is never permission to enter. Stay on public paths and rights of way, ask before crossing private property, and follow local access rules, closures, signage and seasonal restrictions, especially in nature reserves and protected areas.

No bird in Songtrail is worth hopping a fence or walking past a warning sign for. A find you skip today stays findable tomorrow.

Respect the birds

Songtrail is a game about wild animals going about their lives, and watching them should leave no mark.

• Keep your distance. If a bird changes its behaviour because of you, you're too close.
• Never approach, handle, or linger near a nest. Disturbing nesting birds is a criminal offence in Canada, the United States, and many other countries.
• Don't play recorded song to draw birds in, especially during the breeding season.
• Keep dogs under control, and leave habitat the way you found it.

Identifications are a best guess

Songtrail's identifications come from machine-learning models running on your device, and they're often uncertain. That's why the app shows a ranked list with confidence scores instead of announcing one confident answer. The likelihood scores, habitat labels and seasonal hints work the same way. They're there for interest and enjoyment, they can be wrong, and they're not something to lean on where being wrong would matter.

Questions

Anything we've missed, or something unsafe you've spotted in the app? Write to hello@grayforgelabs.com. The Privacy Policy covers what Songtrail does with your information.