Showing results for "unabridged" in Birdwatching

The nation's greatest voice, David Attenborough, reads J. A. Baker's extraordinary classic of British nature writing, The Peregrine. J. A. Baker's classic of British nature writing was first published in 1967. Greeted with acclaim, it went on to win the Duff Cooper Prize, the pre-eminent literary prize of the time. Luminaries such as Ted Hughes, Barry Lopez and Andrew Motion have cited it as one of the most important books in 20th-century nature writing.

Birds. Over 9,000 species, the most widespread of all animals: on icebergs, in the Sahara or under the sea, at home in our gardens or flying for over a year at a time. Earthbound, we can only look and listen, enjoying their lightness, freedom and richness of plumage and song. David Attenborough has been watching and learning all his life. His classic book, now fully updated with the latest discoveries in ornithology, is a brilliant introduction to bird behaviours around the world: what they do and why they do it.

In The Genius of Birds, acclaimed author Jennifer Ackerman explores the newly discovered brilliance of birds and how it came about. Consider, as Ackerman does, the Clark's nutcracker, a bird that can hide as many as 30,000 seeds over dozens of square miles and remember where it put them several months later; the mockingbirds and thrashers, species that can store 200 to 2,000 different songs in a brain a thousand times smaller than ours; and the well-known pigeon, which knows where it's going, even thousands of miles from familiar territory.

In What It's Like to Be a Bird, David Sibley answers the most frequently asked questions about the birds we see most often. This special brand-new audio edition is geared as much to nonbirders as it is to the out-and-out obsessed, covering more than 200 species. While its focus is on familiar backyard birds—blue jays, nuthatches, chickadees—it also examines certain species that can be fairly easily observed, such as the seashore-dwelling Atlantic puffin.

Domesticated since the dawn of man, pigeons have been used as crucial communicators in war by every major historical superpower from ancient Egypt to the United States and are credited with saving thousands of lives. They have been worshipped as fertility goddesses and revered as symbols of peace. Charles Darwin relied heavily on pigeons to help formulate and support his theory of evolution. Yet today they are reviled as "rats with wings."

Bernd Heinrich involves us in his quest to get inside the mind of the raven. But as animals can be spied on only by getting quite close, Heinrich adopts ravens, thereby becoming a "raven father", as well as observing them in their natural habitat. He studies their daily routines and, in the process, paints a vivid picture of the ravens' world. At the heart of this book are Heinrich's love and respect for these complex and engaging creatures, and through his keen observation and analysis we become their intimates, too.

Rosemary and Peter Grant and those assisting them have spend 20 years on Daphne Major, an island in the Galapagos, studying natural selection. They recognize each individual bird on the island, when there are 400 at the time of the author's visit or when there are over a thousand. They have observed about 20 generations of finches - continuously.Jonathan Weiner follows these scientists as they watch Darwin's finches and come up with a new understanding of life itself.

'A tour-de-force survey of how birds live their lives - with all the drama, surprise, humour, sadness and amazement of any human soap-opera' - Stephen Moss, author of Ten Birds That Changed the World 'Utterly fascinating . . . Strassmann is the perfect guide to this world: an author as much...

When Arjan Dwarshuis first heard of the “Big Year”—the legendary record for birdwatching—he was twenty years old, it was midnight, and he was sitting on the roof of a truck in the Andean Mountains. In that moment he promised himself that, someday, somehow, he would become a world-record-holding birder. Ten years later, he embarked on an incredible, arduous, and perilous journey that took him around the globe; over uninhabited islands, through dense unforgiving rainforests, across snowy mountain peaks and unrelenting deserts—in just a single year.

A stunning and panoramic history of native birds in Aotearoa, from the bestselling author of The Meaning of Trees For millions of years, the song of the birds echoed throughout Aotearoa, with no one around to hear it. While the arrival of humans would transform their story forever - birds may...

In The Courage of Birds, Pete Dunne—winner of the American Birding Association’s Roger Tory Peterson Award for lifetime achievement in promoting the cause of birding—chronicles the behavior of the birds of North America.

Targeted to beginners and beyond, National Geographic's fun, inspiring guide to the art, craft, and science of bird-watching combines practical know-how and expert knowledge. Browsable and bursting with helpful illustrations and photographs, Birding Basics offers new ideas for when, where, and how to get to know the birds in your world.

A joyous celebration of Britain’s rich bird life In Birdland, journalist and lifelong birder Jon Gower explores our intimate connection with the bird life around us. From the symphonic song of the wren to the clack of a puffin’s beak and from epic migrations to sunset murmurations, birds are...

From well-known nature and adventure writer Dan Koeppel, whose work has appeared in Audubon and National Geographic Adventure, comes this true story of one bird watcher's incredible achievements.

Fact: Pigeons are amazing, and until recently, humans adored them. We've kept them as pets, held pigeon beauty contests, raced them, used them to carry messages over battlefields, harvested their poop to fertilize our crops—and cooked them in gourmet dishes. Now, with A Pocket Guide to Pigeon Watching, listeners can rediscover the wonder. Equal parts field guide and quirky history, it covers behavior: Why they coo; how they flock; how they preen, kiss, and mate (monogamously); and how they raise their young (on chunky pigeon milk).

In this audio, you'll discover why so many bird species have thrived in Oregon, as well as the new threats they face. By the time you finish this book, you will know which bird is the Oregon state bird, which birds are under threat of extinction, and which habitats are most important for various bird species to continue to thrive. So grab your copy today. You'll be glad you did.

From the beloved New York Times bestselling author of the “fascinating…entertaining” (The Daily Beast) National Book Award finalist The Soul of an Octopus, a charmingly perfect gem of a book about the most exquisite and extraordinary of winged creatures—hummingbirds. As one of the most...

Winner of The Royal Society of Literature Jerwood Award for Non-Fiction in 2011 and the Authors' Foundation Roger Deakin Award in 2011 A stunning debut in the tradition of Robert Macfarlane and Helen Macdonald Of all the birds of the British Isles, the raptor reigns supreme, sparking the...

Can you recognise the cheerful chirrups of the house sparrow? A song thrush singing out at winter's darkest hour? Or the beautiful, haunting call of the curlew? At a time of great anxiety and uncertainty, while coping with the untimely death of his mother, Charlie Corbett realised his perspective on life was slipping. In a moment of despair, he found himself - somewhat damp - lying on the side of a lonely hill staring up at a leaden sky, a melancholy drizzle seeping into his bones.

Between 1970 and 1980, broadcaster Derek Jones invited a host of famous names to chat about their enthusiasm for nature and their encounters with animals. Delving into the BBC Sound Archive to select some of their favourite natural history recordings, they reveal their hitherto unknown passions – from birds and butterflies to the countryside and conservation.