All About Birds: Texas and Oklahoma opens with a fold-out index of birds by categories but the table of contents includes a break down by species within each category.  Early chapters focus on beginning birding, attracting birds to your yard, and getting involved with birding. Especially appreciated is the section on types of food and feeders. A guide to common species found in Texas and Oklahoma follows. Information is drawn from Cornell’s AllAboutBirds.com. As noted in the welcome, each profile includes a map of the usual territory and full-color photos to help with plumage variations. The profile section starts with general tips for identifying birds by various traits and understanding field marks. An end of the book index helps locate specific information. Most birders probably wouldn’t carry this big of a book into the field, but it is great for learning about birds you are looking for at home or in the “wild.” Definitely worth adding to your bird collection. Other titles in the series cover California and four regions of the country.

7 Pleasures of Birding

 Caldecott Award-winning illustrator, Matthew Cordell (Wolf in the Snow) was inspired by a series of comment mades in a documentary called "Birders: The Central Park Effect" to draw the 7 pleasures of birding. He graciously gave me permission to share his art here. I'm posting without additional comment as Cordell and Chris Cooper, who came up with the list, express the joys of birding better than I possibly could. 

All illustrations are copyright Matthew Cordell and are used with permission. 

Superlative Birds

Many of us are enthralled by trivia. As kids we pore over the Guiness Book of World Records and as adults we watch quiz games. For birders, Leslie Bulion's book, Superlative Birds, will provide fodder for Jeopardy and send readers to birding books for more information. Here we learn which bird has the loudest voice (spoiler: although several birds have loud voices, the kakapo of New Zealand has a call that can be heard for miles), which bird weighs the least (easy one; the bee hummingbird is the smallest bird in the world), which is the most gruesome hunter (the shrike is known as the "butcher bird" for a reason), and more. Each superlative is accompanied by a poem and a science note that provides details about the bird and its features. Running commentary by a chickadee answers additional questions and provides details to ponder. There is even a QR code embedded on one page that can be scanned to hear the poem about the Arctic Tern being sung.  Robert Meganck's digital illustrations are whimsical, yet realistic and highlight the superlative feature being discussed.

Shrike (used with permission)

Shrikes are vicious hunters,
impaling insects on barbed wire
(Photo by Jeanette Larson)

As Bulion notes in her final poem, every bird is a superlative bird. But with habitats changing, climate patterns shifting, and pesticides and plastics polluting the earth, the superlative birds she highlights are at risk of disappearing. Back matter includes a glossary and notes on the poetry that explain the style of each poem, and concludes with additional resources for birders. End papers have labeled sketches of the birds; the front identifies the superlatives while the back identifies the bird, allowing for a great trivia contest. With the combination of poetry and science, Superlative Birds provides classroom and curriculum uses that reach beyond birding.





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

Chasing Birds Across Texas: A Birding Big Year

This book was published in 2003 but I only recently came across it while browsing e-books for my Kindle. Yes, for those who love stumbling onto a book while crawling around the library stacks, you can browse electronic book shelves.

This is one man's account of his Big Year of birding. Mark T. Adams' day job  at the time was as an astronomer at McDonald Observatory in the Davis Mountains. In 2000, he had plenty of compensatory and vacation time so decided to take on a Big Year.  As birders know, a Big Year starts on January 1 at 12:00 a.m. and the birder works all year to find as many birds as possible in the wild within a defined area. The year ends on December 31 at  11:59 p.m. local time.

For some people their Big Year covers the entire United States and Canada but others limit their challenge to a region or state. While it is a personal challenge, there are rules: Each species counted must be on the ABA Checklist for the year of the challenge; you have to observe or hear the bird and positively be able to identify it for yourself. As Adams notes, it takes money, time, and stamina to successfully complete a Big Year. He estimates that he spent 1,050 hours over 174 days and made 32 trips away from his home turf, travelling 30,000 miles by car and 18,000 by airplane, to view 489 species in the year. According to his calculations, he saw more than 92% of the state's birds. Wow! I was exhausted just reading the book. Although Adams states that he did not set out to break the Texas record, established in 1995, his efforts ended up tying the record for a Texas Big Year (or any state or province, actually).

Painted Bunting, South Llano River SP

The book reads more like a diary rather than a story, with Adams highlighting the birds he observed, who birded with him or helped him find birds, and pointing out great birding locations across the state. Still, his chronicles fill the book with humor, as well as the drama of unproductive days, when he was outwitted by shy birds or just missed a rare bird that was only several feet away. Birding can be a lonely venture and Adams discusses hours spent sitting in swamps or near trees watching, or meticulously tracking and observing gull after gull to hopefully cull out the one that is different, allowing him to count another species. At the same time, he points out that birders are a friendly and welcoming group of individuals, many of whom invited Adams onto private property to find an elusive species or welcomed him into their homes after a day of birding. Adams also discusses his "nemisis" birds, those birds that everyone else finds but that elude you. For me, that bird was the Painted Bunting until I visited South Llano River State Park where they were in abundance.

Whooping Crane colt
Rockport

I don't claim to be even a middling-level birder, being much closer to novice than expert, so I was enthralled by the variety of species that he found, some easily and some that he truly had to chase. It was also interesting to have Adams chronicle his efforts to see birds that I consider fairly common to the area where I live. He had to make a special trip to Rockport, for example, to see the Whooping Cranes. Lesson being: you have to go where the birds are when they are there. Even more exciting was the list I've been able to make of places to bird that I was totally unaware of and now want to try. For example, a prime birding location is in the cane fields around the Zapata Library pond in Zapata. Apparently it is a well-known stop for seedeaters, those birds with conical shaped beaks. I don't think I've ever seen a White-collared Seedeater, the species that eluded Adams for quite some time. I would keep this book simply to refer to for the most likely places to see specific birds as well as the most likely times of the year to see them. The other fun thing was recognizing names of birders I know if only through Facebook bird groups and pages.

An appendix lists all of the birds he located in the state, providing a great checklist for anyone wanting to try a Big Year in Texas. Or, for me, a Big Decade as it will take me that long to find all of these birds. Adams also provides a detailed list of other species that were reliably reported in Texas during 2000 but not seen by him (and therefore not counted in his Big Year).

Black-throated Green Warbler
Warblers are especially hard to locate
and identify, being the ultimate "LBBs"
(little bitty birds)

While I've seen the movie, The Big Year, and read a couple of Big Year accounts, it was interesting to learn that Adams would go out to hunt a handful of specific birds. The movie makes it look almost random rather than well-planned. He planned his trips to catch migrants and other non-native birds when they would be in specific locations. He often drove and looked, then drove some more eighteen to twenty hours a day, staying in cheap motels to sleep for a few hours before getting up before dawn to chase more birds. Reading these accounts is the closest I'll will come to experiencing a Big Year!

The Sky Painter

Louis Agassiz Fuertes
(Licensed under Creative Commons)

Most of us have probably never heard of Louis Fuertes but if you have visited the American Museum of Natural History in New York you have seen his work. Inspired by John James Audubon, Fuertes became known as the Father of Modern Bird Art. Unlike Audubon and other artists of the time, however, who posed dead birds that they had killed, Fuertes painted living birds in their natural habitats. As a child he cared for injured birds and dreamed of being a bird artist. After learning to paint quickly to capture fast-moving subjects, Fuertes created a new form of bird art that showed birds in action and life in their eyes and feathers. His work appeared in many books of his time and he made many expeditions to "capture" new birds. In the 1920s collector cards featuring his art were included in boxes of baking soda. These cards and his art are credited with helping to turn bird-watching into the popular sport it is today.


The Sky Painter: Louis Fuertes, Bird Artist, by Margarita Engle and illustrated by Aliona Bereghci, is written in the first person and poetically traces Fuertes' life with minimal text. Pages are filled with watercolor and ink drawings of various birds, often labeled for identification. Bereghci doesn't try to mimic Fuertes style in her drawings, and in fact, we only see reproductions of his images in the historical note. The result is an amazingly beautiful book that will surely inspire artists of all ages.

Black-headed heron'
(Licensed under Creative Commons)

Parents and teachers should visit Margarita Engle's website for an activity kit to use with this beautiful book.











Note: I received a copy of the book from the author

A Big Year

Since I started birding, Jim keeps asking me if I plan to do a Big Year. Like every hobby, sport, or avocation birding has its own vocabulary and competitions. For birders the ultimate extreme sport is a Big Year. Casual birders and non-birders may have never heard this term, or even considered that birding could be a competitive sport--but it is.

During a Big Year, birders compete to see who can spot the most species of birds in North America during a yearlong quest that starts on January 1. The concept started in the 1930s and, while there are a few rules, the only referee is the ABA checklist (although there are often arguments among birders). Birders compete using the honor system and, according to some sources, can spend around $10,000 a month getting to birding locations to add species to their lists. This is different from life lists, the very noncompetitive activity where birders keep track of species they encounter over a lifetime.

With only 675 or so indigenous species of birds in North America, beating the record requires chasing rarities and vagrants--birds that show up where they don't belong or normally wouldn't be found. In the movie The Big Year, which stars Steve Martin, Owen Wilson, and Jack Black (and first brought the concept of extreme birding to a wider audience), it was said that winning was possible primarily because of a strong El Niño weather pattern that pushed birds off course from Asia, Europe, and South America. However it gets here, once the bird is in North America, it counts! 

Because of the weather pattern, and the fierce competition of 1998, some birders thought Sandy Komito's record of 745 species would be impossible to break, but don't tell that the the 2013 competitors. Birds have to be listed on the American Birding Association's checklist of 976 accepted birds (Sandy Komito claims his record is 748 because he also recorded 3 birds that were not, at the time, on the ABA checklist but now are). The list includes species that breed in North America, regularly visit here, stray here from other regions, and introduced species that are now part of the avifauna of North America. In the ever-changing world of birds, some species have been split and a couple of species have been added to the North American lists. 2013 competitor Neil Hayward recorded 746 birds plus 3 provisional birds as of December 29. He's waiting for a definitive ruling on his Big Year but regardless of how the ABA counts, it sounds to me like he broke a 15 year record! This is a big deal in the birding world.

Amazon Kingfisher
(Photo used under Creative Commons license.)

Not having the money, time, or "fire in the belly" to do a Big Year, I do still admit to feeling the lure of an exotic species that has shown up when I see posts on the Rare Bird Alert sites (see below). Could I rush down to the Rio Grande Valley to see the Amazon Kingfisher reported to be hanging out at a rest stop? It would only be a four hour drive each way. Gas up the car, Jim!

Then again, it's probably easier (and less expensive) to experience a Big Year vicariously by reading (or viewing) about other people's experiences. In addition to the film, a few good books include:

• The Big Year stars Owen Wilson as the all-time Big Year champ who sets out to beat his own record. A retired CEO (Steve Martin) and a "everyman" techie-type (Jack Black) are just as determined to kick him out of the nest. The movie is based on The Big Year: A Tale of Man, Nature, and Fowl Obsession by Mark Obmascik.

• Wild America: The Record of a 30,000 Mile Journey Around the Continent by a Distinguished Naturalist and His British Colleague by Roger Tory Peterson is not, per se, a Big Year story but it may have started the challenge. During a 100-day tour of America's wildlife refugees in 1953, Peterson and a friend observed 572 species. Three years later an Englishman broke that record following the same route and the competition began. 

• Kingbird Highway; The Story of a Natural Obsession That Got a Little Out of Hand  is Kenn Kaufamn's story of his Big Year. In 1973, at the age of 19, he headed out hitchhiking around the country to try and break a birding record that had stood for 15 years.

Two Grackles at Central Park, Austin

• Lynn E. Barber did a big year totally in the state of Texas and was able to count 522 bird species. In Extreme Birder: One Woman's Big Year she tells the story of doing the full Big Year and finding 723 species. 

A Big Year starts on January 1 and birders generally try to start the year with an exotic or hard to find bird so that you are off to a good start. No one wants to start their Big Year with a grackle. Me? I'm off to see Whooping Cranes and Sandhill Cranes to start my Big New Year. Happy New Year to all!

Note: Rare birds are reported on www.narba.orgwww.narba.org. A sub-site tracks rare birds in Texas http://www.narba.org/default.aspx/MenuItemID/105/MenuGroup/Home.htm.

Books Take Flight: Gift Ideas

Librarians are fond of saying that books help readers fly to new heights and explore new worlds. And I believe that is true. Books can help readers discover new worlds and new interests. They also make great holiday gifts. While books may not always garner the oohs and aahs of the latest Playstation, they last a lot longer. So consider some of these bird books for those on your holiday lists. Bird Brainz will love 'em!

Ok, I'll start with blatant self-promotion. Hummingbirds: Facts and Folklore from the Americas has sold well as a gift not only for young people but for adults who enjoy discovering the cultural background to some of the hummer information. Folktales from cultures across the Americas are retold along side facts that relate to the stories. 

Another favorite of mine is Birds of a Feather by Jane Yolen. Actually Yolen has several books about birds but this one stands out. Combined with a beautiful photograph by Yolen's son, each poem is followed by a few facts about each bird.  


Although there is little or no factual material in Mr. Popper's Penguins, I can trace my fascination with penguins back to reading this classic book. This book is a chapter book for elementary aged readers, although it is also a good family read-aloud. Pair it with One Cool Friend, a picture book by Toni Buzzeo about a child who is drawn to the Magellanic penguins he sees at the aquarium.

Budding birdwatchers will appreciate Look Up!: Bird-Watching in Your Own Backyard, which I reviewed earlier this year. Pair the book with a beginner field guide like Backyard Birds (Field Guides for Young Naturalists) and your young birder will be good to go.

And just for fun, if your young reader loves the game Angry Birds, check out National Geographic Angry Birds: 50 True Stories of the Fed Up, Feathered, and Furious. The book is a hilarious look at real birds who are annoyed, testy, outraged, or furious! Mixed in with funny comments related to the game are photos and facts about real birds and the behaviors that classify them as angry.

These are just a few of my recent favorites and I have mentioned other books in this blog. I hope you will add your favorite bird books for kids in the comments. The birds--and readers--are depending on you.

Look Up!: Bird-Watching in Your Own Backyard

When I talk about birding or my book, Hummingbirds: Facts and Folklore from the Americas, I am often asked for suggestions to help young birders get going on this hobby. Unlike a lot of hobbies, birding takes little or no equipment and can be enjoyed almost anywhere (it's a little harder to bird-watch from the middle of the ocean but even there you may see a few gulls and distance flying birds).

Look Up!: Bird-watching in Your Own Backyard by Annette LeBlanc Cate provides a humorous

introduction to birding for young readers, approximately 8 to 12 years old. Beginning with the inside cover papers and fly leaves, the book is packed with information, facts, and trivia. Birding etiquette and advice is outlined with whimsical asides and comments ("Don't put yourself in harm's way, ever! It's only a bird. Really." Cate became interested in birding as part of doing nature sketches and encourages kids to also draw what they see outside. The focus on the book starts in your own backyard and places close to home. Even in pretty urban settings there are a lot of birds to watch!

Chapters focus on color, shape, behavior, and details (field marks) that offer clues to identification. Even all those little brown birds have distinguishing characteristics! The cartoon-like illustrations and dialogue bubbles make the book fun and enjoyable as well as informative. A two-page map shows the geographic diversity of some of the more than 800 species that call North America home and the book ends with a good look at classification ("Classification Class!") and naming of birds. A bibliography suggests a number of guide books and websites to further help with identification of birds.

Sure, you can buy some fancy stuff for birding but in actuality you don't even need binoculars to start this hobby. But this book sets young birders on the right flight path.



(Note: I received a review copy of this book from the publisher, Candlewick Press.)