Birds of Every Color

This is a simple and clever introduction to birds that will appeal to many ages. One of the main attractions of birding--the thing we ooh and ahh over--are the amazing colors of birds. From red to green and blue, from shimmering to surreal, Sneed B. Collard III has photographed and described the brilliance of feathers, feet, and other bird features. He explains the source of the colors--the food the birds eat that produce Carotenoids, melanins that the bird produces itself, keratin (like our fingernails) that produces structural coloration, and even refracted light going through feathers (which is also a type of structural coloration). While we love the beautiful and seemingly endless colors, colors serve a variety of purposes for the bird, ranging from recognizing individual birds of their own kind, to attracting mates, and hiding from prey. The colors serve an important purpose in bird survival.

Oversized photos are glorious and illustrate the birds in their natural habitats. Written for two reading levels, each page has short sentences ("Brown colors help birds hide.") for younger readers but also more detailed information about the bird, its colors, and habitat in longer paragraphs that will appeal to older readers. A final double-page spread invites readers to identify the colors seen in an array of multicolored birds. The book ends with a glossary of "Colorful Words."

(Photo by J. Larson)

Collard birds with his son, Braden, who took many of the photos. He is also the author, and photographer, of many other bird books, including Fire Birds and Warblers & Woodpeckers: A Father-Son Big Year of Birding. 

It would be easy to quibble about birds that were not included. Some of my favorite, like the Painted Bunting, appear to have every color. However, what is clear is that Collard has covered a wide range of birds in all their dazzling glory very well. And readers will be on the lookout for even more!



FTC Disclosure: I received a complimentary review copy from the publisher. I receive no compensation for reviewing the book.

Best Bird Books of 2018

January always signals the start of the awards season so once again I am sharing Forbes' list of the top bird books of the past year. I've only reviewed one, The Feather Thief, but will be posting about a second, Warblers and Woodpeckers by my friend Sneed B. Collard III, soon. Although I have reviewed several of his books, my review of that book has been delayed by a move from Rockport back to the Austin area. I'll also note that Forbes does not appear to consider books for young people in their review of birding books. Read some of the past year's blog posts for some great books for young people, although I would not dare try to suggest that my reviews make up a "best" list for the year. And keep reading Bird Brainz for some exciting books coming up in 2019. Click here to see the full list and the annotations about the books but the titles are:

• The Ravenmaster: My Life with the Ravens at the Tower of London by Christopher Skaife

• The Feather Thief: Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century by Kirk Wallace Johnson

• The Ascent of Birds: How Modern Science Is Revealing Their Story by John Reilly

• Belonging on an Island: Birds, Extinction, and Evolution in Hawaii by Daniel Lewis

• The Seabird’s Cry: The Lives and Loves of the Planet’s Great Ocean Voyagers by Adam Nicolson

• The Wonderful Mr Willughby: The First True Ornithologist by Tim Birkhead
  

• Mrs Moreau’s Warbler: How Birds Got Their Names by Stephen Moss 

• The Delightful Horror of Family Birding: Sharing Nature with the Next Generation by Eli J. Knapp

• Warblers & Woodpeckers: A Father-Son Big Year of Birding by Sneed B. Collard III

• BirdNote: Chirps, Quirks, and Stories of 100 Birds from the Popular Public Radio Show by BirdNote; edited by Ellen Blackstone

• Hentopia: Create a Hassle-Free Habitat for Happy Chickens; 21 Innovative Projects by Frank Hyman

• The Wall of Birds: One Planet, 243 Families, 375 Million Years by Jane Kim 

Woodpeckers: Drilling Holes & Bagging Bugs

Woodpeckers are odd and fascinating birds. What other bird, for example, intentionally bangs its head against a tree? Most are brightly colored with varying degrees of red, white, and black but some are less flashy. In Woodpeckers, Collard points out that there are more than 200 species of woodpeckers and birds in the Picidae family and they live on every continent except Antarctica and Australia with about twenty-two species in the United States and Canada.


Readers learn that while they all eat bugs (that is what they are looking for in the trees) they also eat sap, seeds, berries, and nuts. A woodpecker's beak bangs away at about 15 mph yet somehow they avoid brain damage. (Find out how in the book.) They also have "amazingly long tongues" and a reinforced beak. Makes sense!

Used under license by Creative Commons

While we meet many species of woodpeckers in this book, the most famous woodpecker is, of course, Woody. Woody was based on an Acorn Woodpecker, one of the species covered by Collard, supposedly because one was banging away on the cabin where Walter Lantz was staying. Acorn Woodpeckers collect thousands of acorns throughout the year, storing them in trees riddled with storage holes, or in old water tanks, vacant houses, and telephone poles.

Collard covers other types of woodpeckers, including sapsuckers (yes, there are yellow-bellied sapsuckers but they are not cowardly) and flickers. The book ends with a look at lost and vanishing woodpeckers. In addition to what Collard has to say, I recommend reading the Race to Save the Lord God Bird by Phillip Hoose, which examines the tragic failure to save the Ivory-billed Woodpecker from extinction.

Copyright Phillip Hoose

Sapsucker; Photo by Jeanette Larson

Woodpeckers is a great introduction to a fascinating and fun species of birds and Collard includes a lot of humor and puns. Check out the two pages of photo bloopers for a fun look at the challenges of bird photography. (Although I have to say Collard's worst photographs are always better than most of mine!). In a book filled with information and colorful photographs, every birder will learn
something new.


Also by Sneed B. Collard III is  Fire Birds: Valuing Natural Wildfires and Burned Forests.

Fire Birds: Valuing Natural Wildfires and Burned Forests

This book offers something a little different for anyone interested in birds. Most of us are very frightened by fire. I still remember my father making me go into the crawl space attic of our house to see if there was smoke or fire after a small kitchen mishap! No way was I going up there! Jim and I declined buying a wonderful house in a canyon in California because of the potential for wildfires and limited exits out of the area. We all watch in jittery awe as blazes consume forests and homes. And, of course, we believe 

Courtesy Nevada Div. of Forestry

Smokey Bear when he tells us that only we can prevent forest fires. Wrong! Many fires are natural and Smokey's message needs to be updated.

Natural wildfires, those not set by pyromaniacs and firebugs and that are not burning down houses, are actually a beneficial part of the natural cycle. Sneed Collard clearly shows how these natural fires benefit the bird population. As he points out, the "eerie landscape of charred, blackened stumps and snags" is filled with wildlife. Fallen trees create nesting areas for more than 15 species of birds in the Western U.S. that thrive in burned forests. While these birds are also found elsewhere, they are abundant in burned forests.

 Licensed under CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons

The book follows the work of  Richard Hutto, a biologist who became interested in the connection between forest fires and wildlife the same year that Yellowstone National Park burned. The book is filled with striking photographs of birds living, feeding, and nesting in burned out areas. One bird, the Black-backed Woodpecker,is the ultimate fire bird, is found almost nowhere other than in burned forests. Although it is not just about birds, other animals also thrive where the birds are doing well, many birds like the dark-eyed juncos, house wrens, northern flickers, western tanager, and others are prevalent in burned forests.

 Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons 

Another biologist, Dr. Vicki Saab, focuses her work on figuring out how to manage burns to support wildlife. The decisions made regarding public lands and fire management "are often driven by politics, money, and the public's negative attitudes toward wildfires." But there is beauty and life in the burned out ecosystems. So next time I'm in a burned out area, I'll be looking for birds that I've never seen elsewhere.