| How to Be a Bad Birdwatcher by Simon Barnes |
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Even the baddest birdwatcher in the world knows something about birds. Contrary to popular belief, you don't have to be an anoraked twitcher with top-of-the-range binoculars to have a good time admiring our often-neglected feathered friends in the sky. In this revolutionary approach to ornithology self-confessed bad birdwatcher Simon Barnes gives us the confidence and motivation to get pleasure from one of the simplest, cheapest hobbies there are: watching birds...without letting birdwatching get in the way. |
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| Birds of Australia by Ken Simpson, Nicolas Day |
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Birds of Australia is the most comprehensive guide available to the extraordinary bird life of Australia. In 132 color plates of remarkable beauty and precision, Nicolas Day captures the details of all 770 of the continent's birds. A succinct text by Ken Simpson and other experts in the field addresses key points of identification while the book's unique handbook section discusses the breeding, behavior, feeding habits, evolution, and taxonomy of each bird family. |
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| Birds of the Isles of Scilly (County Avifaunas S.) by Peter Robinson |
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This is an avifauna for the Isles of Scilly - one of the most popular and exciting birding sites in the whole of Britain. The islands' position, out to the south-west of the tip of Cornwall, means that they are often first landfall for the lost migrant birds from both Europe and Asia to the east, and North America to the west. The annual October pilgrimage to Scilly is a fixed point on many birders' calendars, and these tiny islands have hosted a considerable proportion of extreme rarities and "firsts for Britain". Scilly also has a small but interesting breeding bird population, including some important seabird colonies. This book discusses in detail the status and distribution, past and present, of every bird recorded on Scilly. For the great rarities, a breakdown of all records is provided. Extensive introductory sections describe the climate, vegetation, general ecology and land use of the islands, plus the history of birding and conservation on Scilly. This book is illustrated throughout with line drawings, plus a wealth of maps and charts. |
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| Birds of the Mediterranean (Photographic Guides (Yale University Press)) by Paul Sterry |
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The Mediterranean is remarkably rich with birds, not only because of the great diversity of habitats in the region but also because it provides the main flyway for most migrant breeding species of northern Europe. This stunning new photoguide encompasses all species of birds, including seabirds, found in the countries bordering the Mediterranean Sea and in the adjacent areas with a Mediterranean climate. Featuring nearly 1,000 beautiful color photographs, many of which were taken for this volume, the book presents illustrations and concise accounts of each species. The pocket-sized photoguide is convenient, up-to-date, and accurate. Through the extensive use of digital software to enhance the photographs, the book enables readers to compare similar species easily and to view far more plumage variations than ever before. Armchair travelers, birders in the field, and holiday visitors alike will find this book both delightful and useful. |
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| A Bird in the Bush: A Social History of Birdwatching by Stephen Moss |
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Val Hennessy, Daily Mail, Critic's Choice 30 July 2004
Wonderful... beautifully told. He packs his pages with fascinating, often hilarious anecdotes and information. A surprise and a delight.
John Carey, Sunday Times, 15 August 2004
Eye-opening... An affectionate, enterprising book, which proves that birdwatchers can be as instructive to watch as birds. |
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| Massachusetts Breeding Bird Atlas (Natural History of New England Series) by Wayne R. Petersen, W. Roger Meservey |
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In 1974, the Massachusetts Audubon Society and the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife launched a five-year survey to map the distribution of all the birds that breed in the Commonwealth--the first such comprehensive effort in North America. Nearly 600 volunteers spent countless hours in the field collecting data. This landmark volume presents the results of their efforts. |
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| Gulls : Of North America, Europe, and Asia by Klaus Malling Olsen, Hans Larsson |
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This book represents a significant contribution to the field of gull identification, and merits a spot on the bookshelf of every gull enthusiast. It greatly expands the coverage of earlier classics such as the works of Dwight and Grant, both in terms of geographic scope, and in attention to subspecific variation and the complexities posed by hybridization. The author is to be congratulated for providing a level of quantification not seen in earlier works, as well as for providing an impressive level of detail on distribution and population trends. Hans Larsson's plates demonstrate an impressive ability to capture subtleties of shape and intricacies of plumage that are vital in the identification of such a complex group of birds. The combination of photos with well-executed paintings is a most effective approach to illustrating this group of birds. |
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| The Race to Save the Lord God Bird by Phillip Hoose |
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The tragedy of extinction is explained through the dramatic story of a legendary bird, the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, and of those who tried to possess it, paint it, shoot it, sell it, and, in a last-ditch effort, save it. A powerful saga that sweeps through two hundred years of history, it introduces artists like John James Audubon, bird collectors like William Brewster, and finally a new breed of scientist in Cornell's Arthur A. "Doc" Allen and his young ornithology student, James Tanner, whose quest to save the Ivory-bill culminates in one of the first great conservation showdowns in U.S. history, an early round in what is now a worldwide effort to save species. As hope for the Ivory-bill fades in the United States, the bird is last spotted in Cuba in 1987, and Cuban scientists join in the race to save it.
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| Guide to the Great Florida Birding Trail: East Section by Susan Cerulean, Julie A. Brashears, Nancy Meyer |
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This easy-to-follow guidebook spans 18 counties in eastern Florida to showcase 136 birding sites from the Georgia border to Lake Okeechobee, including the Jacksonville and Orlando metropolitan areas. The sites, organized into clusters of five to ten, are all within an hour's drive of one another and are identified on individual as well as regional maps. Each site is described from a birder's point of view and includes directions, hours of operation, seasonal birding opportunities, and other information essential for a successful outing. |
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| Stokes Field Guide to Warblers by Lillian Stokes |
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From America's preeminent authorities on birds and nature, whose popular Stokes guides have sold nearly 4.5 million copies, comes the easiest-to-use, most comprehensive, most informative guide to North American warblers available. Warblers are among the most colorful and popular of bird species. As they leave the south each spring to breed in the north, their migration inspires warbler festivals, warbler watching and counting clubs, and warbler courses and workshops. For the millions of American birders who seek out these marvelous songbirds, the STOKES FIELD GUIDE TO WARBLERS imparts a wealth of identification and behavior information, presenting each of the 57 warbler species with detailed migration maps and multiple images showing seasonal plumage. |
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| The Carolina Parakeet : Glimpses of a Vanished Bird by Noel F. R. Snyder |
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This book provides the first comprehensive account of the biology of one of North America's most enigmatic and colorful wildlife species, the Carolina Parakeet. The only parrot endemic to the United States, this species once ranged in large, noisy flocks from Florida to New York, and as far west as Colorado. But although it was still widespread and common during the time of John James Audubon (whose illustration of the species is perhaps his finest work), the parakeet was gone completely by the mid-twentieth century. |
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| The Big Year : A Tale of Man, Nature, and Fowl Obsession by Mark Obmascik |
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Every year on January 1, a quirky crowd of adventurers storms out across North America for a spectacularly competitive event called a Big Year -- a grand, grueling, expensive, and occasionally vicious, "extreme" 365-day marathon of birdwatching.
For three men in particular, 1998 would be a whirlwind, a winner-takes-nothing battle for a new North American birding record. In frenetic pilgrimages for once-in-a-lifetime rarities that can make or break their lead, the birders race each other from Del Rio, Texas, in search of the rufous-capped warbler, to Gibsons, British Columbia, on a quest for Xantus's hummingbird, to Cape May, New Jersey, seeking the offshore great skua. Bouncing from coast to coast on their potholed road to glory, they brave broiling deserts, roiling oceans, bug-infested swamps, a charge by a disgruntled mountain lion, and some of the lumpiest motel mattresses known to man.
The unprecedented year of beat-the-clock adventures ultimately leads one man to a new record -- one so gigantic that it is unlikely ever to be bested...finding and identifying an extraordinary 745 different species by official year-end count. |
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| Woodpeckers of Europe: A Study of the European Picidae by Gerard Gorman |
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This is a monograph devoted to the natural history, behaviour and ecology of European woodpeckers. |
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| Twitching Through the Swamp: Droppings from the Natural World by Peter Marren, David Carstairs |
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