10,000 Birds

AUGUST 3, 2021

There was a time when I thought each bird species had its own individual song. Then I found out that there was this vocalization called a ‘call,’ so I thought each bird species had its own individual song (but just the males) and individual call. It encompasses movement and plumage and even smell. How do they know?

North America 278

North America Research Birds Groups 278

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 1, 2020

It was a pleasure to make these observations at the same time I was reading The Bird Way: A New Look at How Birds Talk, Work, Play, Parent, and Think , Jennifer Ackerman’s new book about the diversity and complexity of bird behavior. I do have some minor criticisms, and these are what you may call procedural.

Research 223

Research Birds Science Costa Rica 223

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 2, 2021

This shouldn’t have to be stated, especially in a book on bird evolution by an evolutionary biologist with a Ph.D. But, ‘synthesis’ is a dry word, and this is a book with a quiet yet firm personality underlying its words. The book is smartly organized into 12 chapters. that’s three birds).

Science 214

Science Albatross Research Birds 214

10,000 Birds

JULY 5, 2022

Solid Air: Invisible Killer- Saving Billions of Birds from Windows is the summation of Dr. Klem’s expertise, experience, and professional life–what we scientifically know about bird and glass collisions, a handbook on how to prevent them, and, not insignificantly, the story of a remarkable career.

New York City 254

New York City Birds Illinois Science 254

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 1, 2015

This is the book you will want to give to everyone in your life who has said ‘I’d like to bird too, but ….(fill Not only is Nate a birding and blogging colleague, but Mike Bergin, 10,000 Birds co-publisher, has written the Foreword and I have been threatened with all sorts of birder-type punishment if I give this book a bad review.

Birds 263

Birds North Carolina North America Science 263

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 8, 2023

Two books, two authors, two countries bursting with neotropical avian diversity. Since the books share authors and a creation process, I thought I would review them together. An associated issue is that the Belize and Costa Rica guides share many of the same descriptions of species, written by Howell. Why are these issues?

Costa Rica 213

Costa Rica Belize El Salvador Birds 213

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 26, 2023

That is why I am so pleased to see the new “Gulls of Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East: An Identification Guide” being illustrated with nearly 1400 colour photographs of the 45 species of gulls found in the Western Palearctic. My first impression is that the book is somewhat large and heavy (2.05 pounds, and 6.7

Europe 230

Europe Africa Greece Groups 230

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 3, 2015

Navarro’s exceptional drawings illustrate the species accounts. Forty-eight species. Compare, for example, the species account illustration of the Cuban Trogon with the photo that opens up the introductory chapter. The luxury of space means that each species can be shown from various angles and in distinctive poses.

Cuba 230

Cuba Birds United States 2000 230

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 5, 2019

Her lively block prints adorn calendars, note cards, puzzles, and children’s books, very much in the popular tradition of beloved minimalist Charley Harper. It’s a fun book, offering ideas for projects and, most importantly for me, new ways to observe birds and their natural world.

Birds 149

Birds Eggs Laws Woodpeckers 149

10,000 Birds

MAY 5, 2015

GISS—general impression, size, shape—is intuitive, the result of an unconscious cognitive process derived from experience in the field. The result is a different kind of book. It is not a handbook, though it approaches species from a collective viewpoint. It is not a textbook, though its aim is clearly instructional.

Birds 170

Birds New Jersey Science Groups 170

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 5, 2016

And so, I turn to Better Birding: Tips, Tools & Concepts for the Field , the new book by George L. This is a very different book from what I expected, less of a handbook and more of a comprehensive identification text on 24 groups of birds, presented in words and photographs. It is an intriguing choice of species.

Birds 190

Birds Groups 2015 North America 190

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 25, 2024

And if you take this phrase, “stamps in weathered passports,” my interpretation is that the experiences from travel are the “stamps” as sights, sounds, tastes, smells, textures, on your “passport,” or soul. However, I cannot stop thinking about my name written in that book.

Lesotho 224

Lesotho Sheep South Africa Africa 224

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 7, 2014

It took me a while to wrap my mind around the concept of Birds and People , Mark Cocker and David Tipling’s book that, in 592 pages, explores the intersection of just that—birds and us. Still, I found it a little disjointing that a book has been written about our relationship with birds. So, I just sit here, amazed at this book.

Birds 213

Birds Egypt Family Eagles 213

10,000 Birds

JUNE 3, 2014

One of the reasons I enjoy about reviewing books is the opportunity to read titles I wouldn’t ordinarily encounter, not because they aren’t good but because they don’t fall easily into a category. Lost Animals: Extinction and the Photographic Record by Errol Fuller is one of these books. more than there really was to see!” (p.

Animal 267

Animal Mammals Hawaii Dolphins 267

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 1, 2023

It is home to four diverse forest ecosystems (deciduous, mixed, boreal, and lowlands), experiences seasonal weather systems ranging from cold dry Arctic winters to humid, thunder-storm filled summers, and, according to the latest official checklist, hosts four professional sports teams with bird names.* state and Canadian provinces.

North America 211

North America Birds Owls Canada 211

10,000 Birds

MAY 7, 2019

But, sometimes an appreciation of birds and birding requires more than a reference book with images of birds and facts about their identifying field marks. There are large avian handbooks and small ‘how-to bird’ guides, and quite a few excellent books of both types have been published. And, each essay tells a story.

Birds 115

Birds North America Breeding America 115

10,000 Birds

JULY 7, 2015

Every bird book seems to be about the west coast this month!) I was not planning to do either, but I was going to Catalina Island with my daughter, Sarah, and her boyfriend, Todd, and the hour-long boat ride there and back sounded like an excellent opportunity to try this book out in the field. This is a small book, 56 pages long.

Dolphins 162

Dolphins Whales Whaling Porpoises 162

10,000 Birds

JUNE 4, 2019

And the book is about much more, ripple effects from what happens when part of a living thing becomes the central ingredient to a highly visual, social, profitable business. I did often wonder while reading the book whether the result equaled the effort. It is reprinted in the book, though without artist credit or date. .

Industry 119

Industry Virginia Portland Campaign 119

10,000 Birds

MARCH 6, 2018

It’s not often that we have the opportunity to glimpse the home life of albatrosses, nor of any seabird species. For most seabird species, the male takes the first shift and the male and female then alternate, but the period of time for each shift varies according to species. Bruce Pearson is the book illustrator.

Albatross 114

Albatross Penguins Research Breeding 114

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 19, 2020

With 500 pages, this guide is a bit on the heavy side, but still not too much, having in mind that half of the region falls into the tropics and the edition is dealing with almost a thousand species (989 to be exact). The book ends with three indexes, of scientific, English and Afrikaans names.

Africa 264

Africa South Africa Swaziland Lesotho 264

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 2, 2018

He brings to this book an academic background in biology and horticulture and, more importantly, decades of experience developing strategies for the best backyard bird feeding practices. The book is focused on suburban living, with little attention given to the unique challenges of urban bird feeding.

Birds 173

Birds New York City Squirrels New York 173

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 21, 2021

When you mention “Africa” to a birder, it is likely that at least two thirds will instantly think “Kenya”, and for a good reason: it is home to over 1,060 bird species and boasts many globally important birding areas. The scientific names are not mentioned through the book, but it is certainly useful to have them included here.

Kenya 261

Kenya Africa South Africa Penguins 261

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 2, 2016

It’s time for some short book reviews. Two books are part of series I’ve reviewed previously (and you may want to reread those posts for more detailed info), one is a handbook that I’ve been wanting to review for a long time, but thought that a shorter piece would work better than the long ones I always seem to end up doing here.

Pennsylvania 166

Pennsylvania Texas Whales Whaling 166

10,000 Birds

JUNE 29, 2023

The (Big) Year that Flew By: Twelve Months, Six Continents, and the Ultimate Birding Record – which is the book’s full title, or Arjan Dwarshuis’s Big Year, as I prefer to call it shortly, is a highly anticipated and a long awaited travelogue of the author’s 2016 race against time across 40 countries in his attempt to break the world birding record.

Papua New Guinea 249

Papua New Guinea Guinea Suriname South America 249

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 6, 2022

edited by the Pasadena Audubon Society, with illustrations by Catherine Hamilton and photographs by many, are two very different books. we learn) that are home to coveted boreal species, breeding wood-warblers, and two species of Grouse. There are 461 species on the Maine checklist.

Los Angeles 196

Los Angeles Birds District of Columbia Parrots 196

10,000 Birds

MAY 4, 2017

That sentence really doesn’t begin to describe this very smart and highly readable book. The ‘little green book’ was now over 450 pages long! It was my first trip to the Neotropics, and I had no idea what I was getting into. An enlarged version was published in 1997, with color photographs and more coverage of South America.

South America 151

South America Ecuador Reptiles America 151

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 5, 2013

Experiments in the field (the famed Asa Wright Nature Center veranda) involving Bananaquits and bananas came up with numbers ranging from 7 to 16, but a tanager always came along to interfere with Bananaquits’ noisy appreciation of their namesake fruit. There are two editions of the Kenefick book, the field guide. I was confused.

Trinidad 195

Trinidad Birds South America Research 195

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 4, 2016

This is a very good thing; it means they publish a lot of books about birds (probably more at this point than U.S. This is a hefty book, 560 pages long and dimensions of 6.3 Over 3,200 photographs have been used, most showing species in their habitats. British birders are very serious about birding and their birds.

Ireland 144

Ireland Birds Groups Falcons 144

10,000 Birds

MARCH 16, 2024

Interestingly, a bird of prey set off a psychological experiment. Kenn Kaufman describes a similar case of mass psychosis in his book Kingbird Highway (a Common Redshank with black mud on its beak, I believe). Not just me, many birders can take a leaf out of this young gentleman’s book. Could it be? Tunnel vision?

Psychology 166

Psychology Portugal Japan Eagles 166

10,000 Birds

JULY 3, 2012

Life Along the Delaware Bay: Cape May, Gateway to a Million Shorebirds , by Lawrence Niles, Joanna Burger, and Amanda Dey, is a book with a mission. The numbers, as detailed in this book, are alarming: the horseshoe crab harvest grew from less than 100,000 in 1992 to over 2.5 million in the late 1990’s.

Delaware 179

Delaware New Jersey Research Eggs 179

10,000 Birds

MAY 17, 2020

That piece of information, along with many others, comes from Kroodsma’a new book, Birdsong for the Curious Naturalist : Your Guide to Listening — and you have to love the “nearly.” And that’s part of the point of the book, and its charm – how much there is still to be discovered in the realm of birdsong. Except he doesn’t!

Virginia 243

Virginia Boston North America 2020 243

10,000 Birds

JULY 12, 2020

Another weekend is in the books. A Saturday morning seawatch netted Corey a Cory’s Shearwater , a nice year bird, but he couldn’t get good enough looks at the two Great Shearwaters that went past for him to count them as a new species for his Queens list. What was your best bird of the weekend?

2020 237

2020 New York City Whales Whaling 237

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 21, 2019

I have visited my local landfill for the last seven years, usually several times per winter, only to recently stumble upon a book called the Landfill! here and here ), Tim Dee devoted an entire book to it and I just had to read it. ” Landfill often made me wander off into some half-forgotten gulling experience of mine.

Angola 185

Angola United Kingdom Mozambique Botswana 185

10,000 Birds

JUNE 7, 2012

It’s the warbler that is often the last unchecked species on birders’ life lists and, whether you list or not, for most of us observing it is a once in a lifetime experience. Fish and Wildlife Service endangered species list. At several points in recent history, Kirtland’s Warbler appeared to be on the verge of extinction.

Michigan 229

Michigan Bahamas Endangered Species Research 229

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 29, 2021

Maybe these people like challenges – at least here at the monastery, getting good shots of this species is quite easy. Another species apparently enjoying the proximity of a monastery is the White-winged Grosbeak. My extensive birding experience allows me to be very confident that the bird below is a Rosefinch.

Birds 211

Birds Germany India 2018 211

10,000 Birds

APRIL 27, 2022

While preparing an article this week for a local newspaper on the nighttime denizens of Tobago, it crossed my mind that I never considered owls as a group, far less target species for any particular outing (except for a select few, upon which I shall expound here). This resulted in my only photograph of this species to date.

Trinidad 273

Trinidad Owls Barn Owls Abandon 273

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 18, 2021

A number of species use Chongming as a wintering spot, not just the Cinereous Vultures I already mentioned in a previous post. The many small ponds and waterways attract quite a few ducks, though presumably due to their China experience, they are extremely wary of people. It seems this Eurasian Hoopoe has read some of these books.

China 163

China Ducks Transported Game 163