A reader of this column, Tim McCormack, asked me to suggest a reading list of bird books to provide a good overview of the field of ornithology.\u00a0 After sending him some suggestions, it occurred to me that other readers might be interested in those suggestions as well.<\/p>\n
The number of bird books is huge so the books I discuss below are an eclectic assortment.\u00a0 I have greatly enjoyed reading all of them and found each informative.<\/p>\n
The best college-level textbook on the market is Frank Gill\u2019s Ornithology.\u00a0 The current edition was published in 2007 so is quite up to date.\u00a0 Gill\u2019s text is highly readable; it is chockfull of information without being technical.\u00a0 The book has many figures and photographs to accompany the text.<\/p>\n
The Handbook of Bird Biology is a massive reference volume created by the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology.\u00a0 The book serves as the text for their long-standing Home Study Course in Biology.\u00a0 The book can be purchased without subscribing to the Cornell Lab course.<\/p>\n
The level of the text is similar to Gill\u2019s Ornithology.\u00a0 The Handbook is a cooperative effort with each of the ten chapters being written by one or more ornithologists who are specialists in a particular topic.<\/p>\n
The beauty of bird song captivates birder and non-birder alike.\u00a0 There is an embarrassment of riches on this topic.\u00a0 A good starting point is Don Kroodsma\u2019s The Singing Life of Birds.\u00a0 Kroodsma is a prolific researcher on bird vocalizations, authoring many technical articles on the subject.\u00a0 This book, however, is aimed at a lay audience.\u00a0 Kroodsma explains how our eyes can help our ears by describing sonagrams, computer-generated graphs of sounds.<\/p>\n
The text is a collection of narratives of many different excursions that Kroodsma took to record vocalizations.\u00a0\u00a0 You will go with him close to his home in Massachusetts to record a Hermit Thrush, to Costa Rica to record Wattled Bellbirds and to Oregon to record Bewick\u2019s Wrens.\u00a0 \u00a0In each narrative, Kroodsma explains the particular hypothesis he is testing and presents many sonagrams on the species of interest.\u00a0 Each narrative is a primer on how to do science.<\/p>\n
The book comes with a CD so you can listen to the actual recordings used to generate the sonagrams in the text.<\/p>\n
Another fascinating book is Why Birds Sing by David Rothenberg.\u00a0 The author is a professor of philosophy and a talented jazz clarinetist.\u00a0 His book explores the interface between bird song and the arts.\u00a0 By interviewing scientists and composers, he explores the meaning of bird song, both to avian and human ears, to try to determine why birds sing.\u00a0 I enjoy books that meld different disciplines to construct intriguing connections.\u00a0 This book succeeds in this regard.<\/p>\n
Lots of mammals and insects migrate but none can hold a candle to birds in the extent of their migratory movements.\u00a0 A wonderful introduction to bird migration is Scott Weidensaul\u2019s Living on the Wind: Across the Hemisphere with Migratory Birds.\u00a0 Weidensaul is one of our most gifted nature writers.\u00a0 His lyrical prose takes us to many parts of the world to vicariously experience a migratory spectacle.\u00a0 We go to see the Sandhill Cranes in Nebraska, Red Knots in Delaware, the thousands of songbirds on the Gulf Express, struggling to get to the shores of Gulf Coast states after a non-stop flight from Mexico, and the river of tens of thousands of Broad-winged Hawks passing over Veracruz, Mexico.\u00a0 By the end of the book, you will have experienced fully the phenomenon of bird migration.<\/p>\n
I enjoy books that focus on a single bird species.\u00a0 One of my favorites is Susan Smith\u2019s The Black capped Chickadee: Behavioral Ecology and Natural History.\u00a0 Smith has worked with chickadees for over four decades.\u00a0 She reviews all aspects of the biology of our state bird in a highly readable style.\u00a0 Much of the research she summarizes is her own.<\/p>\n
To get a flavor of field ornithology in the tropics, you will not go wrong by reading Don Stap\u2019s A Parrot with No Name.\u00a0 Staps went on an extended expedition to the Peruvian jungle with a number of ornithologists from Louisiana State University.\u00a0 He takes you to the jungle with all the joy, frustration and anxiety such an experience brings.<\/p>\n
Finally, a couple of books on ornithological history.\u00a0 Joseph Kastner\u2019s A World of Watchers gives a history of ornithology and birding in North America, mostly focusing on the 19th<\/sup> and 20th<\/sup> centuries.\u00a0 For a fascinating account of the life of John James Audubon, you can\u2019t beat Richard Rhodes\u2019 John James Audubon: The Making of an American.<\/p>\n I\u2019d love to hear of your favorite bird books.<\/p>\n [originally published on March 7, 2010]<\/p>\n\n A reader of this column, Tim McCormack, asked me to suggest a reading list of bird books to provide a good overview of the field of ornithology.\u00a0 After sending him some suggestions, it occurred to me that other readers might be interested in those suggestions as well. The number of bird books is huge so […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":146,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[426],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":222,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220\/revisions\/222"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}