Birdology

Author: Sy Montgomery
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 0731815408
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 397

Book Description
Meet the ladies: a flock of smart, affectionate, highly individualistic chickens who visit their favorite neighbors, devise different ways to hide from foxes, and mob the author like she's a rock star. In these pages you'll also meet Maya and Zuni, two orphaned baby hummingbirds who hatched from eggs the size of navy beans, and who are little more than air bubbles fringed with feathers. Their lives hang precariously in the balance-but with human help, they may one day conquer the sky. Snowball is a cockatoo whose dance video went viral on YouTube and who's now teaching schoolchildren how to dance. You'll meet Harris's hawks named Fire and Smoke. And you'll come to know and love a host of other avian characters who will change your mind forever about who birds really are. Each of these birds shows a different and utterly surprising aspect of what makes a bird a bird-and these are the lessons of Birdology: that birds are far stranger, more wondrous, and at the same time more like us than we might have dared to imagine. In Birdology, beloved author of The Good Good Pig Sy Montgomery explores the essence of the otherworldly creatures we see every day. By way of her adventures with seven birds-wild, tame, exotic, and common-she weaves new scientific insights and narrative to reveal seven kernels of bird wisdom. The first lesson of Birdology is that, no matter how common they are, Birds Are Individuals, as each of Montgomery's distinctive Ladies clearly shows. In the leech-infested rain forest of Queensland, you'll come face to face with a cassowary-a 150-pound, man-tall, flightless bird with a helmet of bone on its head and a slashing razor-like toenail with which it (occasionally) eviscerates people-proof that Birds Are Dinosaurs. You'll learn from hawks that Birds Are Fierce; from pigeons, how Birds Find Their Way Home; from parrots, what it means that Birds Can Talk; and from 50,000 crows who moved into a small city's downtown, that Birds Are Everywhere. They are the winged aliens who surround us. Birdology explains just how very "other" birds are: Their hearts look like those of crocodiles. They are covered with modified scales, which are called feathers. Their bones are hollow. Their bodies are permeated with extensive air sacs. They have no hands. They give birth to eggs. Yet despite birds' and humans' disparate evolutionary paths, we share emotional and intellectual abilities that allow us to communicate and even form deep bonds. When we begin to comprehend who birds really are, we deepen our capacity to approach, understand, and love these otherworldly creatures. And this, ultimately, is the priceless lesson of Birdology: it communicates a heartfelt fascination and awe for birds and restores our connection to these complex, mysterious fellow creatures

Living as a Bird

Author: Vinciane Despret
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1509547282
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 180

Book Description
In the first days of spring, birds undergo a spectacular metamorphosis. After a long winter of migration and peaceful coexistence, they suddenly begin to sing with all their might, varying each series of notes as if it were an audiophonic novel. They cannot bear the presence of other birds and begin to threaten and attack them if they cross a border, which might be invisible to human eyes but seems perfectly tangible to birds. Is this display of bird aggression just a pretence, a game that all birds play? Or do birds suddenly become territorial – and, if so, why? By attending carefully to the ways that birds construct their worlds and ornithologists have tried to understand them, Despret sheds fresh light on the activities of both and, at the same time, enables us to become more aware of the multiple worlds and modes of existence that characterize the planet we share in common with birds and other species.

Thinking like a Parrot

Author: Alan B. Bond
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022624878X
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 298

Book Description
From two experts on wild parrot cognition, a close look at the intelligence, social behavior, and conservation of these widely threatened birds. People form enduring emotional bonds with other animal species, such as dogs, cats, and horses. For the most part, these are domesticated animals, with one notable exception: many people form close and supportive relationships with parrots, even though these amusing and curious birds remain thoroughly wild creatures. What enables this unique group of animals to form social bonds with people, and what does this mean for their survival? In Thinking like a Parrot, Alan B. Bond and Judy Diamond look beyond much of the standard work on captive parrots to the mischievous, inquisitive, and astonishingly vocal parrots of the wild. Focusing on the psychology and ecology of wild parrots, Bond and Diamond document their distinctive social behavior, sophisticated cognition, and extraordinary vocal abilities. Also included are short vignettes—field notes on the natural history and behavior of both rare and widely distributed species, from the neotropical crimson-fronted parakeet to New Zealand’s flightless, ground-dwelling kākāpō. This composite approach makes clear that the behavior of captive parrots is grounded in the birds’ wild ecology and evolution, revealing that parrots’ ability to bond with people is an evolutionary accident, a by-product of the intense sociality and flexible behavior that characterize their lives. Despite their adaptability and intelligence, however, nearly all large parrot species are rare, threatened, or endangered. To successfully manage and restore these wild populations, Bond and Diamond argue, we must develop a fuller understanding of their biology and the complex set of ecological and behavioral traits that has led to their vulnerability. Spanning the global distribution of parrot species, Thinking like a Parrot is rich with surprising insights into parrot intelligence, flexibility, and—even in the face of threats—resilience.

The Life of the Skies

Author: Jonathan Rosen
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 9780374186302
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 348

Book Description
Aerial delights: A history of America as seen through the eyes of a bird-watcher John James Audubon arrived in America in 1803, when Thomas Jefferson was president, and lived long enough to see his friend Samuel Morse send a telegraphic message from his house in New York City in the 1840s. As a boy, Teddy Roosevelt learned taxidermy from a man who had sailed up the Missouri River with Audubon, and yet as president presided over America’s entry into the twentieth century, in which our ability to destroy ourselves and the natural world was no longer metaphorical. Roosevelt, an avid birder, was born a hunter and died a conservationist. Today, forty-six million Americans are bird-watchers. The Life of the Skies is a genre-bending journey into the meaning of a pursuit born out of the tangled history of industrialization and nature longing. Jonathan Rosen set out on a quest not merely to see birds but to fathom their centrality—historical and literary, spiritual and scientific—to a culture torn between the desire both to conquer and to conserve. Rosen argues that bird-watching is nothing less than the real national pastime—indeed it is more than that, because the field of play is the earth itself. We are the players and the spectators, and the outcome—since bird and watcher are intimately connected—is literally a matter of life and death.

Animals and Human Society

Author: Colin G. Scanes
Publisher: Academic Press
ISBN: 0128054387
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 542

Book Description
Animals and Human Society provides a solid, scientific, research-based background to advance understanding of how animals impact humans. Animals have had profound effects on people from the earliest times, ranging from zoonotic diseases, to the global impact of livestock, poultry and fish production, to the influences of human-associated animals on the environment (on extinctions, air and water pollution, greenhouse gases, etc.), to the importance of animals in human evolution and hunter -gatherer communities.As a resource for both science and non-science, Animals and Human Society can be used as a text for courses in Animals and Human Society or Animal Science, or as supplemental material for Introduction to Animal Science. It offers foundational background to those who may have little background in animal agriculture and have focused interest on companion animals and horses. The work introduces livestock production (including poultry and aquaculture) but also includes coverage of companion and lab animals. In addition, animal behavior and animal perception are covered.Animals and Human Society is likewise an excellent resource for researchers, academics, or students newly entering a related field or coming from another discipline and needing foundational information, as well as interested laypersons looking to augment their knowledge on the many impacts of animals in human society. - Features research-based and pedagogically sound content, with learning goals and textboxes to provide key information - Challenges readers to consider issues based on facts rather than polemics - Poses ethical questions and raises overall societal impacts - Balances traditional animal science with companion animals, animal biology, zoonotic diseases, animal products, environmental impacts and all aspects of human/animal interaction

Gifts of the Crow

Author: John Marzluff
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1439198748
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 320

Book Description
Offers insight into crows' ability to make tools and respond to environmental challenges, explaining how they engage in human-like behaviors, from giving gifts and seeking revenge to playing and experiencing dreams.

Scarlet Experiment

Author: Jeffrey Karnicky
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
ISBN: 0803295731
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 243

Book Description
Emily Dickinson's poem "Split the Lark" refers to the "scarlet experiment" by which scientists destroy a bird in order to learn more about it. Indeed, humans have killed hundreds of millions of birds--for science, fashion, curiosity, and myriad other reasons. In the United States alone, seven species of birds are now extinct and another ninety-three are endangered. Conversely, the U.S. conservation movement has made bird-watching more popular than ever, saving countless bird populations; and while the history of actual physical human interaction with birds is complicated, our long aesthetic and scientific interest in them is undeniable. Since the beginning of the modern conservation movement in the mid-nineteenth century, human understanding of and interaction with birds has changed profoundly. In Scarlet Experiment, Jeff Karnicky traces the ways in which birds have historically been seen as beautiful creatures worthy of protection and study and yet subject to experiments--scientific, literary, and governmental--that have irrevocably altered their relationship with humans. This examination of the management of bird life in America from the nineteenth century to today, which focuses on six bird species, finds that renderings of birds by such authors as Henry David Thoreau, Emily Dickinson, Don DeLillo, and Christopher Cokinos, have also influenced public perceptions and actions. Scarlet Experiment speculates about the effects our decisions will have on the future of North American bird ecology.

Birds and People

Author: Mark Cocker
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 1448163471
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 592

Book Description
There are 10,500 species of bird worldwide and wherever they occur people marvel at their glorious colours and their beautiful songs. We also trap and consume birds of every kind. Yet birds have not just been good to eat. Their feathers, which keep us warm or adorn our costumes, give birds unique mastery over the heavens. Throughout history their flight has inspired the human imagination so that birds are embedded in our religions, folklore, music and arts. Vast in both scope and scale, Birds and People explores and celebrates this relationship and draws upon Mark Cocker’s 40 years of observing and thinking about birds. Part natural history and part cultural study, it describes and maps the entire spectrum of our engagements with birds, drawing in themes of history, literature, art, cuisine, language, lore, politics and the environment. In the end, this is a book as much about us as it is about birds. Birds and People has been stunningly illustrated by one of Europe’s best wildlife photographers, David Tipling, who has travelled in 39 countries on seven continents to produce a breathtaking and unique collection of photographs. The book is as important for its visual riches as it is for its groundbreaking content. Birds and People is also exceptional in that the author has solicited contributions from people worldwide. Personal anecdotes and stories have come from more than 650 individuals in 81 different countries. They range from university academics to Mongolian eagle hunters, and from Amerindian shamans to some of the most celebrated writers of our age. The sheer multitude of voices in this global chorus means that Birds and People is both a source book on why we cherish birds and a powerful testament to their importance for all humanity.

Monogamy

Author: Ulrich H. Reichard
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521525770
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 282

Book Description
This book explores the biological roots of social, sexual and reproductive monogamy in birds, mammals and humans.

Communication in Humans and Other Animals

Author: Gisela Håkansson
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9027272018
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 256

Book Description
Communication is a basic behaviour, found across animal species. Human language is often thought of as a unique system, which separates humans from other animals. This textbook serves as a guide to different types of communication, and suggests that each is unique in its own way: human verbal and nonverbal communication, communication in nonhuman primates, in dogs and in birds. Research questions and findings from different perspectives are summarized and integrated to show students similarities and differences in the rich diversity of communicative behaviours. A core topic is how young individuals proceed from not being able to communicate to reaching a state of competent communicators, and the role of adults in this developmental process. Evolutionary aspects are also taken into consideration, and ideas about the evolution of human language are examined. The cross-disciplinary nature of the book makes it useful for courses in linguistics, biology, sociology and psychology, but it is also valuable reading for anyone interested in understanding communicative behaviour.