In this book, Adrian Koopman describes the complex relationship between birds, the Zulu language and Zulu culture. A number of chapters look at the underlying meaning of bird names, and here we will find that the Zulu name of the Goliath Heron means ‘what gives birth to baby crocodiles’, the dikkop (umbangaqhwa) means ‘what causes frost’, and the African Hoopoe is a party-goer who wears a colourful blanket.

The book goes further than just Zulu names, exploring the underlying meanings of bird names from other South African languages and languages from Central and East Africa. Here we find birds with names that translate as ‘cool-porridge’, ‘kiss-banana-flower’ and ‘waiter-at-the-end-of-the furrow’.

A focus on Zulu traditional oral literature details the roles birds have played in Zulu praise poetry (including the praise poems of certain birds themselves) and in proverbs, riddles and children’s games. Also considered is traditional bird lore, examining the role played by various species as omens and portents, as indicators of bad luck and evil, as forecasters of rain and storm, and as harbingers of the seasons. Here we see that the Bateleur Eagle (ingqungqulu) is linked to war, the Southern Ground Hornbill (insingizi) to thunder and heavy rain, the Red-chested Cuckoo (uphezukokhono) to the start of the ploughing season, and the Jacobin Cuckoo (inkanku) to the start of summer.

Zulu Bird Names and Bird Lore discusses the Zulu Bird Name Project, a series of Zulu bird name workshops held between 2013 and 2017 with Zulu-speaking bird guides designed to confirm (or otherwise) all previously recorded Zulu names for birds, while at the same time devising new names for those without previously recorded names. The result has been a list of species-specific names for all birds in the Zulu-speaking region. Finally, the book turns to the role such new bird names can play in conservation education and in avi-tourism.

Matt Sewell takes you on a world tour, exploring the most amazing birds on every continent Find out about enormous condors, gorgeous bird of paradise and monkey-eating eagles. There are peacocks, vultures, puffins, owls, robins, eagles, cockatoos, penguins, flamingos, cranes and many more. These are all amazing birds in their own individual way - birds that migrate thousands of miles, have brilliant showy mating rituals, survive in extreme environments, are super-fast, super-brave or super-big! Sections on each continent - Europe, Asia, Africa, Australasia, North America, South America and Antarctica - include sumptuous maps to pore over. Matt Sewell writes in his characteristic humorous style that will make the reader laugh as they learn, and he illustrates in gloriously colourful watercolours.

In this unique and unprecedented study of birding in Africa, historian Nancy Jacobs reconstructs the collaborations between well-known ornithologists and the largely forgotten guides, hunters and taxidermists who worked with them. Drawing on ethnography, scientific publications, private archives and interviews, Jacobs asks: How did white ornithologists both depend on and operate distinctively from African birders? What investment did African birders have in collaborating with ornithologists? By distilling the interactions between European science and African vernacular knowledge, this work offers a fascinating examination of the colonial and postcolonial politics of expertise about nature. It is also a riveting history of the discovery of certain bird species.

How can you tell when a Rufous or a Ruby-throated hummingbird will be in your neighborhood? What is the correct sugar-to-water ratio for your visiting hummingbirds? Should you put red dye #2 in the mixture? How do you keep that feisty Rufous from scaring other hummers away? Hummingbird enthusiast Dan True answers these questions and many more in this beautifully illustrated, informative guide to the sixteen species of hummingbirds that breed in the United States and Canada. Available in this handy guide are life-size photos of the male and female of each of the sixteen species, detailed information on each species, maps showing where the species can be spotted, how hummers mate, when and where they migrate to and from, and new banding information. There is also easy-to-follow, step-by-step information on how to photograph hummingbirds in flight. True has spent years talking to other hummer experts and enthusiasts and includes here anecdotes from all over the country that help readers understand why hummingbirds do what they do. An indispensable book for any one with a hummingbird feeder.

What's the difference between a swallow and a swift? How many species of ducks, penguins, owls or thrushes are there? Which is the rarest parrot or the most endangered hummingbird? What do toucans eat? Discover all the key facts about the world's orders and families of birds with this ultimate handbook. Expert ornithologist Jonathan Elphick provides a comprehensive survey of every one of the 36 orders and 234 families of birds, revealing their remarkable diversity, appearance, behaviour and lifestyle. With clear, lively text, informative fact boxes that include the latest research and data, and special photography from award-winning wildlife photographers such as David Tipling, The Handbook of Bird Families belongs on the shelf of everyone interested in birds.

No group of animals is more visible, ubiquitous and easier to see than birds. From frigatebirds soaring over Rio de Janeiro to bowerbirds displaying in the suburbs of Canberra, penguins in Cape Town to pelicans in San Francisco and huge flocks of starlings roosting around the Colosseum in Rome, the world's cities provide a remarkable array of avian sights, sounds and spectacles. Through Stephen Moss's expert knowledge and insight, Urban Aviary provides city-dwellers around the world with a guide to some of the most extraordinary species of birds that live alongside them, including helpful spotting hints and fact boxes for each bird, all of which are brought to life by Marc Martin's distinctive and beautiful watercolours.

While birding literature is filled with tales of expert observers spotting rare species in exotic locales, John Yow reminds us that the most fascinating birds can be the ones perched right outside our windows. In thirty-five engaging and sometimes irreverent vignettes, Yow reveals the fascinating lives of the birds we see nearly every day. Following the seasons, he covers forty-two species, discussing the improbable, unusual, and comical aspects of his subjects' lives. Yow offers his own observations, anecdotes, and stories as well as those of America's classic bird writers, such as John James Audubon, Arthur Bent, and Edward Forbush. This unique addition to bird literature combines the fascination of bird life with the pleasure of good reading.

Back by popular demand, Checklist of Birds in Southern Africa is a new, updated edition of what was long a popular resource. It lists all the birds to be seen in the region and provides a simple way of recording where and when you have spotted them.

Pocket-sized for ease of use, it offers:

- Cross-referencing to Sasol Birds of Southern Africa, fourth edition

- Six columns for multiple recordings at sixdifferent localities

- Up-to-date names for all southern African birds

- Endemic and threat status for all birds

This revised, updated checklist will be sought after by the region's twitchers at all levels.

An exquisite collection of baby bird paintings by a masterful artist.

"Adaptive Strategies and Population of Northern Grouse "was first published in 1988. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions.

The first volume contains eleven studies of eight grouse species; the second contains primarily the work of Bergerud, which utilizes the evidence in the first volume to advance theories of behavior and offer new demographic insights.

This second volume contains primarily the work of Bergerud, which utilizes the evidence in the first volume to advance theories of behavior and offer new demographic insights.

Rising from sandbars on the Platte River with clarion calls, the sandhill crane ("Grus canadensis") feels the urgency of spring migration. Elegant, noble, and spiritual, the sandhill crane is one of the most ancient of all birds. More than a half-million strong, flying in squadrons, these majestic creatures point northward to their Arctic and sub-Arctic breeding ranges. Theirs is an epic story of endurance through the ages. With 153 stunning color photographs, "On Ancient Wings" presents sandhill cranes in their wild but increasingly compromised habitats today. Over the course of five years, Michael Forsberg documented the tall gray birds in habitats ranging from the Alaskan tundra, to the arid High Plains, from Cuban nature preserves to suburban backyards. With an eye for beauty and an uncommon persistence, the author documents the cranes' challenges to adapt and survive in a rapidly changing natural world. Forsberg argues that humankind, for its own sake, should secure the cranes' place in the future. "On Ancient Wings" intertwines the lives of cranes, people, and their common places to tell an ancient story at a time when sandhill cranes and their wetland and grassland habitats face daunting prospects.

This compact guide to the birds and other wildlife of the National Botanical Garden at Kirstenbosch identifi es a range of the more visible creatures found here. Targeted at both regulars and new visitors to the gardens, this book raises awareness of the rich and diverse animal community, the most conspicuous of which are the birds.

It provides visitors with information on the behaviour, diet and breeding biology of 88 bird species, and the vivid photographs make for easy identification. There is also a summary of the mammals, reptiles, amphibians and other animals found in the gardens. Alongside guides to the flora, this pocket-sized and easy-to-use booklet is the ideal companion for visitors to Kirstenbosch.

A celebrated figure in myth, song, and story, the nightingale has captivated the imagination for millennia, its complex song evoking a prism of human emotions,-from melancholy to joy, from the fear of death to the immortality of art. But have you ever listened closely to a nightingale's song? It's a strange and unsettling sort of composition-an eclectic assortment of chirps, whirrs, trills, clicks, whistles, twitters, and gurgles. At times it is mellifluous, at others downright guttural. It is a rhythmic assault, always eluding capture. What happens if you decide to join in? As philosopher and musician David Rothenberg shows in this searching and personal new book, the nightingale's song is so peculiar in part because it reflects our own cacophony back at us. As vocal learners, nightingales acquire their music through the world around them, singing amidst the sounds of humanity in all its contradictions of noise and beauty, hard machinery and soft melody. Rather than try to capture a sound not made for us to understand, Rothenberg seeks these musical creatures out, clarinet in tow, and makes a new sound with them. He takes us to the urban landscape of Berlin-longtime home to nightingale colonies where the birds sing ever louder in order to be heard-and invites us to listen in on their remarkable collaboration as birds and instruments riff off of each other's sounds. Through dialogue, travel records, sonograms, tours of Berlin's city parks, and musings on the place animal music occupies in our collective imagination, Rothenberg takes us on a quest for a new sonic alchemy, a music impossible for any one species to make alone. In the tradition of The Hidden Life of Trees and The Invention of Nature, Rothenberg has written a provocative and accessible book to attune us ever closer to the natural environment around us.

The Roberts Bird Guide (2nd Edition) has gone to great trouble to concentrate on, and illustrate, difficult-to-identify species and family groups such as raptors, warblers, cisticolas and waders. Special attention has been given to make sure there is far greater coverage of male-female differences and there are also many more juvenile illustrations. Unlike all previously published southern African bird guides, this new edition will be scattered with informative photographs that are incorporated in the text pages and each plate illustration is augmented with an introduction. Apart from the approximately 240 plate spreads, the guide also has 12 photographic and illustrated double spreads that show head enlargements and other details. Plates are annotated far more definitively than other guides – highlighting key identification features, especially for difficult-to-identify species.

How birds have evolved and adapted to survive winter Birds in Winter is the first book devoted to the ecology and behavior of birds during this most challenging season. Birds remaining in regions with cold weather must cope with much shorter days to find food and shelter even as they need to avoid predators and stay warm through the long nights, while migrants to the tropics must fit into very different ecosystems and communities of resident birds. Roger Pasquier explores how winter affects birds (TM) lives all through the year, starting in late summer, when some begin caching food to retrieve months later and others form social groups lasting into the next spring. During winter some birds are already pairing up for the following breeding season, when health through the winter contributes to nesting success. Today, rapidly advancing technologies are enabling scientists to track individual birds through their daily and annual movements at home and across oceans and hemispheres, revealing new and unexpected information about their lives and interactions. But, as Birds in Winter shows, much is visible to any interested observer. Pasquier describes the season (TM)s distinct conservation challenges for birds that winter where they have bred and for migrants to distant regions. Finally, global warming is altering the nature of winter itself. Whether birds that over millennia have evolved to survive this season can now adjust to a rapidly changing climate is a problem all people who enjoy watching them must consider. Filled with elegant line drawings by artist and illustrator Margaret La Farge, Birds in Winter describes how winter influences the lives of birds from the poles to the equator.

This is the perfect chance to immerse yourself in the uplifting sounds of a perfect country morning, from the comfort of your own home. At dawn, in our countryside, there is a pronounced peak in bird singing activity. This is especially noticeable for about an hour after the first light in temperate zone woodlands during spring and early summer. At this time, male birds defend their territories and attract females with their songs. The recordings on this CD are a selection of British woodland recordings, taken from the extensive collection of the wildlife section of the British Library sound archive.

From water birds to birds of prey to the complex order of perching birds, Oklahoma is remarkable for the variety and extent of its bird life. Ornithologists, students, and amateur birders alike will welcome this comprehensive and lavishly illustrated guide to birds in the state by Frederick M. Baumgartner and A. Marguerite Baumgartner.

Fifty-one color plates and 58 line drawings of Oklahoma birds by artist Wallace Hughes as well as more than 150 black-and-white photographs compiled by Herbert Chezem, including numerous remarkable photographs of birds in action, illustrate the text.

In a sense this book is a garden-based autobiography of Britain's most famous birdwatcher. The main narrative covers Bill's personal relationship, not only with his present garden, which was described by the Daily Mail as "Probably the most bizarre back garden in Britain", but also with the gardens he has known throughout his life. The first was what he has called "a sink full of mud" in industrial Rochdale in the 1940s. Next came a larger garden on the edge of Birmingham which he used as a bird ringing station, sometimes helped or hindered by his granny, who often trimmed the lawn with a pair of scissors!In Tales of Ludicrous Bird Gardens there are plenty of eccentric stories about garden characters such as the 'feng shui fox', who constantly rearranged the ornaments, 'Limpy', the one-legged single-parent Great Tit, and one memorable nightmarish occasion when over 50 rats came to visit! This book is NOT an instructional guide on 'How to be a ludicrous gardener' although it may well prove inspirational to others to have a go, or to warn them on what to avoid. Bill abhors decking, large concrete patios, and above, all leaf-blowers.As well as neighbours who whinge about the parakeets! What is certain about Tales of Ludicrous Bird Gardens is that Bill's entertaining take on gardening for birds makes compelling reading.

The comprehensive, handy guide to British birds. Discover a wealth of information about the appearance, behaviour and habitats of British birds, as well as practical advice on birdwatching and how to go about it, featuring tips and advice on necessary equipment, identifying features and how to attract birds into your garden. The clear text and beautiful colour photography will quickly help you identify anything from a Goldcrest to a Guillemot.

When a bus driver takes a break from his route, a very unlikely volunteer springs up to take his place —- a pigeon! But you’ve never met one like this before. As he pleads, wheedles, and begs his way through the book, children will love being able to answer back and decide his fate. In his hilarious picture book debut, popular cartoonist Mo Willems perfectly captures a preschooler’s temper tantrum.

Mo Willems is a six-time Emmy Award–winning writer and animator for Sesame Street and the creator of Cartoon Network’s Sheep in the Big City. He lives with his family in Brooklyn, New York.

This comprehensive encyclopedia of the world's birds presents a fantastic visual guide to the major avian species and families, from America's tiniest insect-catchers to the giant, flightless species still living on the African plains. A 420-page directory features fully illustrated entries for hundreds of birds, as well as detailing many other related species. The activities of birds are explored in a natural history section, detailing anatomy, flight, feeding, pairing and nesting. There are also tips on birdwatching for those who want to get a closer look at these fascinating creatures. This is an authoritative and sumptuous guide to the diversity of bird life across the globe.