The Birder's Handbook: A Field Guide to the Natural History of North American Birds

Product Description This is the most complete and authoritative reference book about the birds of North America—up to date and in field-guide format. The Birder's Handbook is the first of its kind: a portable library of fascinating information not included in your identification guide. For each of the 646 species of birds that breed in North America, The Birder's Handbook will tell you at a glance: * Where the bird nests, and which sex(es) build(s) the nest; * How many eggs the bird lays, what they look like, which patent incubates and for how long, and how the young are cared for; * Food preferences and foraging habits. You will also find information about displays and mating, wintering, conservation status, and much more. In addition, The Birder's Handbook contains some 250 short essays covering all aspects of avian natural history. Amazon.com Review Compact and yet filled with information, this portable encyclopedia of North American bird behavior is a complement to field guides. Learn more about the species you see in the field, and--when in doubt--use this handy reference as another tool for identification. Review Susan Roney Drennan Editor, American Birds A dizzyingly competent, extraordinarily readable, impeccably comprehensive and marvelously educational feat! Certainly mandatory reading for everyone even remotely curious about the birds they watch. Mercedes S. Foster Research Zoologist and Curator of Birds, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service The Birder's Handbook is a gold mine...that will greatly enhance the joys of watching birds. David S. Wilcove Ecologist, The Wilderness Society Field guides will help you to recognize birds. This book will help you to understand them....This book should be required reading for all birders, naturalists, and conservationists. Thomas E. Lovejoy Smithsonian Institution Anyone who owns a field guide to the identification of North American birds will want The Birder's Handbook as a companion volume. About the Author Paul R. Ehrlich is Bing Professor of Population Studies and Professor of Biology at Stanford University, and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. He is the author of over 400 scientific articles and more than 20 books, including  The Population Bomb, Extinction, and  The Machinery of Nature. David S. Dobkin is the author of The Birder's Handbook. Darryl Wheye is the author of  The Birder's Handbook.  Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Introduction How often have you come across a bird on a spring morning and stood motionless in an effort to determine what it was doing; to see whether it was near its nest, and if so, what kind of nest it built, or to see why it was holding its tail in an unusual position? Have you wondered what it ate, how many mates it had, how many eggs would occupy its nest, how long it would take them to hatch, or how helpless its hatchlings would be? While there are excellent field guides to help identify that bird, none provide comprehensive information on what it is doing, and why. This field guide takes up where the others leave off -- that is once you have identified a bird. First, you can refer to an up-to-date condensed description of the biology of the species you have in view, and then you can read two or three brief essays which expand on that information and fit your bird into "the big picture" of avian ecology, behavior, and evolution. As you become familiar with this book's format, you will find that it also serves as a guide to what is not known about the biology of North American birds. We have indicated where, by making careful observations, you can contribute to the science of ornithology (see "Observing and Recording Bird Biology," p.XXVII). The Birder's Handbook: A Field Guide to the Natural History of North American Birds includes all bird species (some 650 of them) known to nest regularly on the continent, north of the Mexican border (with the exception of some exotic species