How to go from a beginner to an expert birder
Better Birding reveals the techniques expert birders use to identify a wide array of bird species in the field-quickly and easily. Featuring hundreds of stunning photos and composite plates throughout, this book simplifies identification by organizing the birds you see into groupings and offering strategies specifically tailored to each group. Skill building focuses not just on traditional elements such as plumage, but also on creating a context around each bird, including habitat, behavior, and taxonomy-parts so integral to every bird's identity but often glossed over by typical field guides. Critical background information is provided for each group, enabling you to approach bird identification with a wide-angle view, using your eyes, brain, and binoculars more strategically, resulting in a more organized approach to learning birds.
Better Birding puts the thrill of expert bird identification within your reach.
- Reveals the techniques used by expert birders for quick and easy identification
- Simplifies identification with strategies tailored to different groupings of birds
- Features hundreds of photos and composite plates that illustrate the different techniques
- Fosters a wide-angle approach to field birding
- Provides a foundation for building stronger birding skills
Autorentext
George L. Armistead is events coordinator at the American Birding Association and a research associate in the Ornithology Department at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University. He has led birding tours on all seven continents. Brian L. Sullivan is eBird program codirector and photographic editor for Birds of North America Online at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. He is the author of numerous papers on bird identification and the coauthor of The Crossley ID Guide: Raptors and Offshore Sea Life ID Guide: West Coast (both Princeton).
Zusammenfassung
How to go from a beginner to an expert birderBetter Birding reveals the techniques expert birders use to identify a wide array of bird species in the field-quickly and easily. Featuring hundreds of stunning photos and composite plates throughout, this book simplifies identification by organizing the birds you see into groupings and offering strategies specifically tailored to each group. Skill building focuses not just on traditional elements such as plumage, but also on creating a context around each bird, including habitat, behavior, and taxonomy-parts so integral to every bird's identity but often glossed over by typical field guides. Critical background information is provided for each group, enabling you to approach bird identification with a wide-angle view, using your eyes, brain, and binoculars more strategically, resulting in a more organized approach to learning birds.Better Birding puts the thrill of expert bird identification within your reach.Reveals the techniques used by expert birders for quick and easy identificationSimplifies identification with strategies tailored to different groupings of birdsFeatures hundreds of photos and composite plates that illustrate the different techniquesFosters a wide-angle approach to field birdingProvides a foundation for building stronger birding skills
Inhalt
Acknowledgments 8
Introduction 10
Wide-Angle Birding: Be the Bird, See the Bird 11
Becoming a "Good Birder": Understanding the Basics 12
Birding Mentors 26
Why Birding Is Cool 26
Waterbirds
Loons 29
Swans 45
Mallard and Monochromatic "Mallards" 57
White Herons 69
Coastal Birds
Eiders 83
Brachyramphus Murrelets 93
Pacific Cormorants 103
Seabirds
Sulids: Northern Gannet and Boobies 115
Tropical Terns 129
Atlantic Gadflies 137
Large Shorebirds
Curlews 149
Godwits 161
Skulkers
Marsh Sparrows 175
Small Wrens (Troglodytes and Cistothorus) 187
Birds of Forest and Edge
Accipiters 199
American Rosefinches 211
Aerial Insectivores
Swifts 221
Night Birds
Screech-Owls: An "Otus" and the Megascops 231
Nighthawks 241
Open-Country Birds
Yellow-bellied Kingbirds 253
Black Corvids: Crows and Ravens 265
Pipits 281
Longspurs 293
Cowbirds 303
Index 312