north america

Part natural history, part artist’s diary, this book documents the extraordinary effort to place a series of public memorials to birds driven to extinction in modern times. As a chronicle of humankind’s impact on our changing world and a moving record of dwindling biodiversity, the project is an ode to vanished times and vanished species. The Great Auk, Labrador Duck, Passenger Pigeon, Carolina Parakeet, and Heath Hen once populated North America from the shores of Labrador and New York to the midwestern plains. Across the continent the skies were once nearly black with Passenger Pigeons whose disappearance, like the buffalo’s, was thought to be inconceivable. As works of site-specific environmental art, the sculptures featured in The Lost Bird Project were placed in the location where the bird was last seen in the wild and are now permanent public sculpture installations at a wide range of sites, from Newfoundland to Florida, Ohio to Martha’s Vineyard. Ten years in the making, The Lost Bird Project has been the subject of a feature-length documentary film that premiered in New York City in December 2011. This book launches in concert with the Fold a Flock origami bird initiative in schools and Audubon centers across the United States (http://foldtheflock.org/).

This pocket guide takes the authority and reputation of National Geographic’s top-selling “Field Guide to the Birds of North America” and makes it accessible for those new to birding. This book meets the same standards of excellence, trimmed down in size and content, tailored to the needs of an eager beginner who may not want to invest in a more comprehensive field guide. Affordable, beautifully illustrated, and easy to carry, this entry-level birding title will welcome newcomers to an activity enjoyed by millions.

This title is not held in stock but we are happy to supply on special order. Please contact us. This marvellous edition of Audubon’s Birds of America displays all 435 of Audubon’s brilliant handcoloured engravings in exquisite reproductions taken from the original plates of the Audubon Society’s archival copy of the rare Double Elephant Folio. Although many attempts have been made to re-create the magnificent illustrations in Audubon’s masterpiece, nothing equals the level of fidelity or scale achieved in this high-quality edition. Completely reorganized and annotated by Roger Tory Peterson, who was American’s best known ornithologist, and issued with the full endorsement and cooperation of the Audubon Society, this volume is the first, in more than a century and a half since its publication, to rearrange the plates in a more scientific order. Peterson’s fascinating introduction places Audubon in the context of the history of American ornithological art and also reproduces a wide sampling of the work of Audubon’s notable predecessors and disciples, including Peterson’s own justly famous paintings. This new systematic arrangement of the prints, complete with thorough, informative commentaries about each bird, not only makes the Birds of America more accessible than ever before, but made it possible to correct many of the problems or errors in Audubon’s original edition that later scholarship revealed.

The culmination of many years of research, observation, and study, this new field guide includes more species, more photographs, and more useful identification information than any other photographic field guide. The guide features 853 North American bird species and more than 3,400 stunning colour photographs. And yet it’s portable enough to fit in your pocket! The photographs cover all significant plumages, including male, female, summer, winter, immature, morphs, important subspecies and birds in flight. Also included are: * the newest scientific and common names and phylogenetic order; * special help for identifying birds in flight through important clues of behaviour, plumage, and shape; * detailed descriptions of songs and calls; * important behavioural information; * key habitat preferences of each species; and * the newest range maps, detailing species’ winter, summer, year-round ranges, and migration routes.

Combining informative and accessible text, up-to-date maps, and – above all – stunning color photographs, this is the best and most lavishly illustrated photographic guide to the birds of eastern North America. All of the images have been carefully selected to convey both the sheer beauty and the key identification features of each bird, and many of the photos are larger than those found in other guides. Wherever possible, a variety of plumages are pictured, providing visual coverage and usefulness matching any artwork-illustrated field guide. And many of the images are state-of-the-art digital photographs by Brian Small, one of North America’s finest bird photographers. These pictures, many seen here for the first time, reproduce a previously unimaginable level of detail. Finally, the ranges of nearly all species are shown on maps from the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, the authority on North American birding. New and experienced birders alike will find this guide indispensable: the clear layout will help novices easily identify the birds they see, while the superb photographs will help seasoned birders confirm identifications.
This is the best, most lavishly illustrated photographic guide to the region’s birds Larger color photos than most other field guides. It features fresh contemporary design – clear, easy-to-use, and attractive. It is informative, accessible, and authoritative text. It includes range maps from the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. It covers entire eastern half of mainland North America and the arctic and subarctic territorial islands of the U.S. and Canada. See also [stock id 30498].