Urban Birder

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Urban Birder

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1Bowerbirds-Library
abr. 10, 2012, 2:50 am

Has anyone else read The Urban Birder by David Lindo? I have just read it and with the exception of the early chapters that describe about being a bird mad youngster, found it rather disappointing. More of a list of birds and locations, and lacking any real poetry of place or passion.

Is it simply that I love birds but am not a twitcher and so am not on the same wavelength as the author? Should I stick to Mark Cocker, Richard Mabey etc in future or can anyone suggest any more poetic rather list making birders to read?

2reading_fox
abr. 10, 2012, 8:35 am

simon barnes - how to be a bad bird watcher

Which doesn't describe any specific birds at all, but does help you realise why just watching sparrows can be as interesting as treking across the world to view a very rare lesser spotted brown thing.

3Porius
Editat: abr. 10, 2012, 10:51 am

Louis Halle is a terrific birdwriter. SPRING IN WASHINGTON is a good example.
http://www.netwalk.com/~vireo/014.html

4chrisharpe
abr. 13, 2012, 4:08 am

Hello Ruth, it seems that birding memoirs are coming out all the time now, so I would expect the quality to be variable. I don't know David Lindo, but the topic of birding in cities could be very interesting. A Mark Cocker book that is about twitching - and I found enormously enjoyable and very well written - is Birders: Tales of a Tribe. For something similar from the other side of the pond, there's the classic Kingbird Highway by Kenn Kaufman. There have been lots of "big year" type memoirs since. Not urban, but have you tried J. A. Baker - The Peregrine? Or what about Aldo Leopold - A Sand County Almanac?

5affle
abr. 16, 2012, 5:27 am

Hi Ruth, here are a couple more to think about. Birdscapes was published in the US in 2009, but has just emerged in paperback in the UK. The author Jeremy Mynott was chief executive of Cambridge University Press (and should certainly have known better than to allow his publisher - Princeton University - to use one of the nastiest display typefaces I've ever seen) and I'd call his approach intellectual rather than poetic, but it couldn't be further from a twitcher's list: it's a long exploration of the ways we find birds interesting, and why - full of interest.

My second offering is poetic enough: Richard Mabey's The Barley Bird about nightingales. It's a re-working of an earlier book in a good quality (and rather expensive for its size) edition by an outfit called Full Circle Editions. I think your design interests will respond to the illustrations by Derrick Greaves, though I think Full Circle have rather let him down - the images are taken from individual works which had titles when they were exhibited, but unhelpfully are not titled in the book, and they have been reproduced without margins which makes them look a little like wrapping paper. They may still be around on the web, where they looked better, in my view.

6affle
maig 26, 2012, 6:12 am

This is off-topic, but we don't seem to have a group to discuss good writing about the natural world generally. Or I've forgotten about it. John Sutherland - the eminent lit crit - reviews five books in today's FT which may be of interest:

www.ft.com/cms/s/2/b1522c72-a4c1-11e1-9a94-00144feabdc0.html?ftcamp=published_links%2Frss%2Flife-arts%2Ffeed%2F%2Fproduct&ftcamp=crm/email/2012526/nbe/ArtsLeisure/product#axzz1vxwmTUIe

The one I recognise is the Robert Macfarlane book, which I've had pre-ordered for ages, and is due out in a couple of weeks or so. I'll be looking out for the others to see what they're like.

7Bowerbirds-Library
juny 20, 2012, 1:33 am

Hello everyone, many thanks for all the suggestions and sorry for the delay in replying!

Reading_fox thank you for your suggestion of Simon Barnes - I am a fan of his and love to read his columns in The Times and the RSPB magazine.

Porius, I hadn't heard of Louis Halle before and shall definitely be taken a look at the their work. Many thanks for the suggestion.

Chris, I have Birders by Mark Cocker on my shelf already, it is waiting to be read. Ditto JA Baker's The Peregrine. I hadn't heard of Aldo Leopold's work and so shall keep a look out for it and for Kingbird Highway by Kenn Kaufman.

Affle, wonderful suggestions, I saw Jeremy Mynot on the BBC's Bird's Britannia series of programmes and so will definitely look out for his book. I like to read anything by Richard Mabey, but currently don't own Barleybird (again eyes open for a copy).

I am off to Hay-on-Wye on Friday for the weekend and have my fingers crossed for some good finds.

8Bowerbirds-Library
juny 20, 2012, 1:53 am

Hello Affle,

Thought I would do a separate message for the link to the book reviews. Many thanks, this looks like a great selection of books. Strands was the Radio Four book of the week recently and was read by the author on location. It most certainly looks like one for the collection.

I checked the last of groups and there was a group called Nature Lit, which is now dormant. I think that we should start a new group for general nature books/discussions etc. Do you have any ideas for a good name? I was thinking of 'The Tangled Bank' ? Or maybe Nature Notes?

Bye for now,
Ruth (Bowerbird No:1)

9chrisharpe
juny 21, 2012, 4:36 am

Yes, it would be good to have a "books on nature" group, but I'm not sure whether it would be better to resurrect the old one or start anew. Ruth, A Sand County Almanac is a wonderful book, and probably just what you're looking for in the first message. There's a very poignant encounter with a wolf and cub, that is lodged in my mind forever. The nice thing about Leopold is that he's a great writer, AND a real outdoorsman and ecologist, whereas some more recent nature writers seem to be writing at one remove from their subject, unwilling or unable to get their hands dirty, or else lacking the deep well of knowledge and experience that Leopold draws from. Good luck at Wye - you should see some waterbirds!

10bluejw
juny 21, 2012, 4:52 pm

Hi all
I'd like to second chris's recommendation for Kingbird Highway.
This is a great book for multiple reasons. First of course it is
a great read, especially if done with Peterson's Wild America.

But the second is maybe more important.....it is a great recommendation to make for young teen. It is a book
many of them can relate to and it can trigger an interest in nature.
I have over the years given copies or recommended it to several young folks and they mostly all enjoyed it.

Bluejw