Birds of paradise have long played a central part in human mythologies and captured the imagination of collectors, scientists, and naturalists. Birds of Paradise provides the first comprehensive, up-to-date, and scientifically accurate overview of the behavior, biology, ecology, biogeography, and history of the most ornate and dramatic group of birds on earth. The book is lavishly illustrated with specially commissioned color depictions of all 42 species of birds of paradise and original line drawings of many behaviors never before recorded, as well as numerous maps and graphs. This stunning book will delight a wide range of readers, from professional ornithologists to amateur naturalists.

This is a question-oriented volume with a solid organismal foundation that will help to bridge the gap between evolutionary ecologists and parasitologists. A range of experts have written chapters that review general concepts and provide a detailed survey of the parasites of a major group of hosts. The book concludes with extensive reviews of methods used to study bird parasites. It is a novel and valuable tool for anyone interested in understanding host-parasite interactions, particularly from an evolutionary perspective.

This is the first comprehensive field guide dealing exclusively with the birds of this region. It covers all the species, including vagrants, found in Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, Aruba, Curacao, Bonaire, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana. Over 2,300 species are accurately illustrated with a total of nearly 6,400 images. Concise caption text appears on the plates and distribution maps appear opposite the plates. This authoritative book will not only be an indispensable guide to the visiting birder, but also a vital tool for those engaged in work to conserve and study the avifauna of this region, which is of such importance to both the indigenous species and those which pass through on migration. A companion to Birds of Northern South America: An Identification Guide - Species Accounts Volume 1 and Volume2 available as a shrinkwrapped set: 0 7136 6026 0 GBP85

Many raptors, the hawks, eagles, and falcons of the world, migrate over long distances, often in impressively large numbers. Many avoid crossing wide expanses of water and follow "flyways" to optimize soaring potential. Atmospheric conditions and landscape features, including waterways and mountain ranges, funnel these birds into predictable bottlenecks through which thousands of daytime birds of prey may pass in a short time. Birders and ornithologists also congregate at these locations to observe the river of raptors passing overhead (as did hunters in the United States in the past and in some countries even today).

Keith L. Bildstein has studied migrating raptors on four continents and directs the conservation science program at Hawk Mountain Sanctuary, Pennsylvania, the world's first refuge for migratory birds of prey. In this book, he details the stories and successes of twelve of the world's most important raptor-viewing spots, among them Cape May Point, New Jersey; Veracruz, Mexico; Kekoldi, Costa Rica; the Strait of Gibralter, Spain; and Elat, Israel. During peak migration, when the weather is right, the skies at these sites, as at Hawk Mountain, can fill with thousands of birds in a single field of view. Bildstein, whose knowledge of the phenomenon of raptor migration is comprehensive, provides an accessible account of the history, ecology, geography, science, and conservation aspects surrounding the migration of approximately two hundred species of raptors between their summer breeding sites and their wintering grounds. He summarizes current knowledge about how the birds' bodies handle the demands of long-distance migration and how they know where to go.

Migrating Raptors of the World also includes the ecological and conservation stories of several intriguing raptor migrants, including the Turkey Vulture, Osprey, Bald Eagle, Western Honey Buzzard, Northern Harrier, Grey-faced Buzzard, Steppe Buzzard, and Amur Falcon.

New Jersey provides some of the most varied and exciting birding in North America, and more than 450 species have been recorded in the state. Yet there has been no comprehensive and readily available guide to the status and distribution of all these species--until now. The Birds of New Jersey is the most up-to-date and succinct guide for the birds of New Jersey and includes all species known to the state from historical times to the present. Featuring over 200 color photos of rarities and regular species, this book authoritatively provides individual entries that include a summary of status and seasonal distribution, and comments on changes over time. Detailed color-coded maps accompany species accounts, and for species recorded five or fewer times, dates and locations of each record are noted. The introduction examines the state's geography, the history of bird records, and background information to species accounts, and the extensive bibliography guides birders to original sources used in the book. This is the essential resource for birders, ornithologists, and nature enthusiasts interested in the birds of New Jersey and the greater surrounding region. * Most up-to-date status and distribution guide for New Jersey and surrounding region * All bird species known to the state * Species accounts describe the preferred habitat and abundance of species * Range maps in color detail seasonal distribution * For migratory birds, spring and fall migration times indicated * More than 200 color photographs of rare and common species

Birds of the Horn of Africa is widely regarded as the best field guide to the more than 1,000 species of resident, migrant, and vagrant birds found in northeast Africa--and it just got even better. Now fully revised and expanded, this comprehensive, easy-to-use guide has been updated with the latest information on distribution, identification, and taxonomy. New vagrants to the region have been added; color plates, illustrations, and distribution maps have been thoroughly updated and improved; and much more--making this still the must-have guide for birders, naturalists, and travelers in the region. * Covers Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti, Somalia, and the Socotra archipelago* Features more than 2,600 illustrations on 213 stunning color plates* Provides a color distribution map for every species* Detailed species accounts on facing pages describe key identification features, similar species, geographical variation, habitat, status, and voice* Includes a glossary, identification tips, and information about habitats* Key identification features are shown more prominently in the text* Now includes an annotated distributional checklist by country and a comparison table for large white-headed gulls

Bird song is one of the most remarkable and impressive sounds in the natural world, and has inspired not only students of natural history, but also great writers, poets and composers. Extensively updated from the first edition, the main thrust of the book is to suggest that the two main functions of song are attracting a mate and defending territory. It shows how this evolutionary pressure has led to the amazing variety and complexity we see in the songs of different species throughout the world. Writing primarily for students and researchers in animal behavior, the authors review over 1000 scientific papers and reveal how scientists are beginning to unravel and understand how and why birds communicate with the elaborate vocalizations we call song. Highly illustrated throughout and written in straightforward language, Bird Song also holds appeal for amateur ornithologists with some knowledge of biology.

During the nineteenth century, Britain maintained a complex network of garrisons to manage its global empire. While these bases helped the British to project power and to secure trade routes, they served more than just a strategic purpose. During their tours abroad, many British officers engaged in formal and informal scientific research. In this ambitious history of ornithology and empire, Kirsten A. Greer tracks British officers as they moved around the world, just as migratory birds traversed borders from season to season. Greer examines the lives, writings, and collections of a number of ornithologist-officers, arguing that the transnational encounters between military men and birds simultaneously shaped military strategy, ideas about race and masculinity, and conceptions of the British Empire. Collecting specimens and tracking migratory bird patterns enabled these men to map the British Empire and the world, and therefore to exert imagined control over it. Through its examination of the influence of bird watching on military science and soldiers' contributions to ornithology, Red Coats and Wild Birds remaps empire, nature, and scientific inquiry in the nineteenth-century world.

The first part of this book describes a wide variety of seabirds from the author's personal observation and knowledge of their ways; the second offers reflective essays on the general theme of birds in their relation to man. Originally published in 1970. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

"Physiological Adaptations for Breeding in Birds" is the most current and comprehensive account of research on avian reproduction. It develops two unique themes: the consideration of female avian reproductive physiology and ecology, and an emphasis on individual variation in life-history traits. Tony Williams investigates the physiological, metabolic, energetic, and hormonal mechanisms that underpin individual variation in the key female-specific reproductive traits and the trade-offs between these traits that determine variation in fitness.

The core of the book deals with the avian reproductive cycle, from seasonal gonadal development, through egg laying and incubation, to chick rearing. Reproduction is considered in the context of the annual cycle and through an individual's entire life history. The book focuses on timing of breeding, clutch size, egg size and egg quality, and parental care. It also provides a primer on female reproductive physiology and considers trade-offs and carryover effects between reproduction and other life-history stages. In each chapter, Williams describes individual variation in the trait of interest and the evolutionary context for trait variation. He argues that there is only a rudimentary, and in some cases nonexistent, understanding of the physiological mechanisms that underpin individual variation in the major reproductive life-history traits, and that research efforts should refocus on these key unresolved problems by incorporating detailed physiological studies into existing long-term population studies, generating a new synthesis of physiology, ecology, and evolutionary biology.

Bird flight has always intrigued mankind. This book provides an up to date account of our existing knowledge on the subject, as well as offering new insights and challenging some established views.
A brief history of the science of flight introduces the basic physical principles governing aerial locomotion. A treatment of flight-related functional morphology concentrates on the difference in shape of the arm and hand part of the wings, on the structure and function of tails, and on the shape of the body. The anatomy and mechanical properties of feathers receive special attention. Aerodynamic principles used by birds are explained in theory by simply applying Newton's laws, and in practice by showing the direction and velocity of the attached flow around an arm wing cross section and of the leading edge vortex flow above a hand wing. The Archaeopteryx fossils remain crucial in our understanding of the evolution of bird flight despite the recent discovery of a range of well-preserved ancient birds.
A novel insight into the interactions between wings and air challenges established theories relating to the origin of bird flight. Take-off, flapping flight, gliding and landing are the basic ingredients of bird flight, and birds use a variety of flight styles from hovering to soaring. Flight muscles consisting of mosaics of specialized fibers are the engines that generate the force required to keep the wings and tail in the gliding configuration and perform work during flapping motion. The energy required to fly can be estimated or measured directly, and a comparison of empirical results provides insights into the trend in metabolic costs of flight of birds varying in shape and massfrom hummingbirds to albatrosses.

As the study of cooperative breeding systems expands, a number of key species form the examples that underpin our general understanding. The ostrich is increasingly becoming such a textbook species, on the basis of the results obtained in Brian Bertram's study of vigilance and egg discrimination in this extraordinary bird. Here Bertram presents new data on the ostrich communal nesting system, in which several females lay in one female's nest, with only one female and the male doing all the work. The Ostrich Communal Nesting System unravels the basis of the cooperation observed, and explains how a system involving apparent altruism is maintained by natural selection. It is now possible as never before to explain and quantify the effects of the different choices these birds make and to integrate ecological and morphological factors such as predation and size. Based on three seasons of study in Tsavo West National Park in Kenya, this book depended on recognizing individual birds, detecting and monitoring well-concealed nests, determining motherhood of eggs from their surface appearance, and time-lapse photography of nests. Key findings were that females could switch rapidly between reproductive strategies, that a nesting female could recognize her own eggs and when necessary discriminate against those of other females, and that the whiteness of ostrich eggs is an adaptation that protects them against overheating but at the cost of greater vulnerability to predation.

Originally published in 1992.

The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

When zoologist Max Terman came to the rescue of a great horned owlet in a Kansas town park, he embarked on an adventure that would test his scientific ingenuity and lead to unprecedented observations of an owl's hidden life in the wild. In "Messages from an Owl," Terman not only relates his experiences nursing the starving owlet, "Stripey," back to health and teaching it survival skills in his barn, but also describes the anxiety and elation of letting a companion loose into an uncertain world. Once Terman felt that Stripey knew how to dive after prey, he set the owl free. At this point his story could have ended, with no clue as to what the young bird's fate would be--had it not been for Terman's experimentation with radio tags. By strapping the tags to Stripey, he actually managed to follow the owl into the wild and observe for himself the behavior of a hand-reared individual reunited with its natural environment.

Through this unique use of telemetry, Terman tracked Stripey for over six years after the bird left the scientist's barn and took up residence in the surrounding countryside on the Kansas prairie. The radio beacon provided Terman with information on the owl's regular patterns of playing, hunting, exploring, and protecting. It enabled him to witness the moments when Stripey was bantered and mobbed by crows, when other owls launched fierce attacks, and when a prospective mate caught Stripey's eye. On occasional returns to the barn, the owl would follow Terman around as he performed chores, usually waiting for a handout.

Until now, scientists have generally believed that an owl nurtured by humans becomes ill-adapted for meeting the challenges of life in the wild. Terman's research proves otherwise. Stripey surpassed all expectations by becoming a totally independent wild creature. With Terman, however, Stripey remained tame, allowing the author to explore something one rarely sees in owls: a warm interest in humanity. Terman engagingly re-creates this dimension of Stripey as he describes with humor and compassion the daily challenges of probing the life of a "phantom winged tiger."

Originally published in 1997.

The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

An overview of the extensive and frequently controversial literature on communally breeding birds developed since the early 1960s, when students of evolution began to examine sociality as a product of natural selection. Jerram Brown provides original data from his own theoretical and empirical studies and summarizes the wide array of results and interpretations made by others.

Originally published in 1987.

The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Bird Nests and Construction Behaviour provides a broad view of our current understanding of the biology of the nests, bowers, and tools made by birds. It illustrates how birds, among vertebrates, have more impressive and consistent building abilities than any other builders, excluding humans. However, birds seem to require no special building equipment and use quite uncomplicated behavior. The book raises general issues in the field of behavioral ecology, including the costs of reproduction, sexual selection, and the organization and complexity of behavior. This volume was written for students and researchers of animal behavior, behavioral ecology, and ornithology, it will nevertheless make fascinating reading for architects and engineers interested in understanding how structures are created by animals.

A SPECTATOR BOOK OF THE YEAR Longlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year 'Rich and joyous ...The book's quiet optimism about our ability to change, and to learn to love small things passionately, will stay with me for a long time' Helen Macdonald 'Big-hearted and quietly gripping' Guardian 'I love Jon Day's writing and his birds. A marvellous, soaring account' Olivia Laing '[A] beautiful book about unbeautiful birds' Observer 'This is nature writing at its best' Financial Times 'Awash with historical and literary detail, and moving moments ... Wonderful' Telegraph 'Every page of this beautifully written book brought me pleasure' Charlotte Higgins 'A vivid evocation of a remarkable species and a rich working-class tradition. It's also a charming defence of a much-maligned bird, which will make any reader look at our cooing, waddling, junk-food-loving feathered friends very differently in future' Daily Mail 'Endlessly interesting and dazzlingly erudite, this wonderful book will make a home for itself in your heart' Prospect As a boy, Jon Day was fascinated by pigeons, which he used to rescue from the streets of London. Twenty years later he moved away from the city centre to the suburbs to start a family. But in moving house, he began to lose a sense of what it meant to feel at home. Returning to his childhood obsession with the birds, he built a coop in his garden and joined a local pigeon racing club. Over the next few years, as he made a home with his young family in Leyton, he learned to train and race his pigeons, hoping that they might teach him to feel homed. Having lived closely with humans for tens of thousands of years, pigeons have become powerful symbols of peace and domesticity. But they are also much-maligned, and nowadays most people think of these birds, if they do so at all, as vermin. A book about the overlooked beauty of this species, and about what it means to dwell, Homing delves into the curious world of pigeon fancying, explores the scientific mysteries of animal homing, and traces the cultural, political and philosophical meanings of home. It is a book about the making of home and making for home: a book about why we return.

This spectacular new field guide is the ultimate reference to the birds of Argentina and the islands of the South-west Atlantic, essential for researchers, birders and conservationists alike. Covers Argentina and all Fuegian and Hornean islands south to the Diego Ramírez Islands and east to the Falklands. More than 2,300 images of original artwork illustrate 1,075 species, including all residents, migrants and most vagrants. 199 stunning colour plates depict every species and many distinct plumages and subspecies, including 28 endemics and 17 near-endemics. Concise text on key identification features and accurate, up-to-date colour distribution maps opposite the plates for ease of reference.

This book reviews comprehensively incubation effects on embryonic development in birds and reptiles and presents the first ever synthesis of data from these two vertebrate classes. The book is in three parts. The first deals with the structure, shape and function of eggs. The second examines the effects of the four main parameters on the process of incubation: temperature, water relations, respiratory gas exchange, and turning. The third section deals with early embryonic development and the methods used to investigate and manipulate the embryo. Further chapters deal with aestivation, megapodes and oviparity. International experts in each field have contributed to this extensively referenced volume and it will be of great interest not only to research biologists, but also to bird and reptile breeders, whether in commercial organisations or in zoos.

Amazing as it might sound, ornithologists are still discovering an average of five or six bird species each year that are completely new to science. These aren't all obscure brown birds on tiny islands - witness the bizarre Bare-faced Bulbul from Laos (2009), spectacular Araripe Manakin from Brazil (1998), or gaudy Bugun Liocichla from north-east India (2006). Birds New to Science documents over half a century of these remarkable discoveries, covering round 300 species. Each account includes the story of discovery, a brief description of the bird (many with accompanying photographs), and details of what is known about its biology, range and conservation status. Written in an engaging style, this is a rich reference to an incredible era of adventure in ornithology.

Birds show bewildering diversity in their life histories, mating systems and risk of extinction. Why, for example, are fairy-wrens so sexually promiscuous while swans show life long monogamy? This fascinating book is a comprehensive re-appraisal of avian diversity, and is the most extensive application of modern comparative methods yet undertaken. "I think this is a marvellous book - the most exciting I have read for a long time... A terrific text for both final year undergraduates and for graduate courses, as well as required reading for academics working in the field." Professor Nick Davies, University of Cambridge

Harriers are a world-wide group of birds of prey whose mating systems, population dynamics, and evolution are well-studied. This is the first book to synthesise and analyse the masses of data on the behavioural ecology of harriers. It offers an intriguing comparison of breeding systems among harriers in the northern and southern hemispheres, and includes a new phylogeny of the harriers, based on the most recent DNA findings. It is illustrated throughout with original line drawings of these impressive birds.

This book is a result of the authors' more than 40 years of study on the behavior, populations, and heavy metals in the colonial waterbirds nesting in Barnegat Bay and the nearby estuaries and bays in the Northeastern United States. From Boston Harbor to the Chesapeake, based on longitudinal studies of colonial waterbirds, it provides a clear picture of the toxic trends and effects of heavy metals in the aquatic environment. The authors take a food web, ecosystem approach to contaminants, using population dynamics, habitat selection, and inputs to the bay to examine metal levels. They also look at the human dimension, discuss what metals in birds tell us about human exposure, and describe stakeholder involvement in these issues. The book covers numbers and dynamics, colony sites and locations, and prey contaminant levels, and compares them to other comparable coastal estuaries. It uses colonial waterbirds as the focal point for an ecosystem approach to metals that begins with prey fish and goes through invertebrates to humans. Additionally, it provides information based on long-term integrative studies the authors have done on metal levels and bird species and compares the findings with data from the Harbor Estuaries Program, other Northeast bays, the Great Lakes, and the Wadden Sea.