The Unfeathered Bird, Review by Chuck McAlexander

The Unfeathered Bird
Katrina van Grouw
Princeton University Press, 2013

The first thing you notice about this book is the alert and watchful attitude of the male Indian Peafowl (or peacock) on the dust jacket. He is dark and jagged, dangerous looking and has a full set of ghostly display feathers that make his head come off the page in your direction. He is staring at you with no eyes. He is, after all, a skeleton and the threat he poses is more of a dare. He seems to ask, “Do you have the nerve to see what’s inside? It might change your appreciation of your beloved birds. And change is always risky.” 

The skill to create this masterful drawing along with the intelligence and nerve to use it in such an important place are indicative of the high level of work and unfettered creativity to be found inside. The drawings reveal detail and shape so well you feel you should be able to pick up the bones and rotate them for better understanding. Even more impressive is the way artist/author van Grouw manages to get a drawing of a skeleton to impart something of the behavior of the bird. Or maybe, by revealing such detail of form, she is demonstrating the way structure and behavior are linked, influencing each other in an eternal dance of changes. This might be one of the reasons the book exists at all. 

In fact, she says just that in the introduction, but not until after she rushes to reassure the squeamish that there are no “guts or gizzards” included in the book. While this is technically accurate, there is a gray area where you could accuse her of transgressing the spirit of the statement. The “ick” response is generally triggered by the presence of soft tissue, especially if it looks wet or slimy. You will find windpipes (tracheae), tongues, voice boxes (syrinxes or syringes) and muscles in some of the drawings. Probably the worst offender is the Trumpet Manucode (p. 278, a bird-of-paradise) with its “extraordinary coiled windpipe” which may well be taken for a pile of intestines were it not for the neatness of the coil. Thus, the extremely sensitive reader might be bothered by this breach. To her credit, however, van Grouw made these soft parts as dry as the bones, but still just as alive. Her treatment is well within the spirit of her promise. 

Her second disclaimer, that there is “no biochemistry and very little physiology” is completely accurate. I did, however, have to crack open my Webster’s 11th to be sure of that. It would indeed be difficult to cover much biochemistry or physiology without the organs, tissues and cells, a.k.a. “guts and gizzards” dispensed with in the first disclaimer. So, having fenced off these two big areas of anatomy from our fragile senses, what remains? Morphology – and the book has it in spades. 

The organization of the material in the book is as logical as it is delightfully unorthodox. Rather than covering the various aspects of avian structure in modern taxonomic order she reaches back to “the first truly scientific classification of the natural world – the Systema Naturae of Linnaeus”. What her book has in common with that one is a concern with outward appearances and the structures which form them. She invokes the concept of convergent evolution as an explanation of the underlying logic. It serves well. However, if you are disturbed by this heresy, try to remember this is ostensibly an art book. It just happens to have a more than generous helping of clear, understandable text to help you comprehend what is in the drawings. 

The book is divided into two uneven parts. The small first part uses more familiar species, to Europeans at least, to demonstrate and explain the basic structures common to all birds. Van Grouw is thorough but doesn’t belabor the point she is making. As an example, there are six drawings revealing the left leg and foot of a Mallard covering two adjacent pages (pp. 16-17). The text describes how the leg fits together and how it articulates, but it is all in plain English, with little reliance on technical nomenclature. She does call a “thigh bone” a femur, but a hip is still a hip and a knee is a knee. She wants you to understand the basic structure so when you look at the leg of another bird, a Southern Screamer for example, you see the same parts, but also the differences – that is, after all, the point of the book. She isn’t trying to bury you in information. To prove my point (and belabor it a bit), she describes the scaly, unfeathered part of a bird’s legs and feet, but did not once use the term podotheca. 

The second, and by far the larger part of the book, describes anatomical structures found in birds with shared behaviors or niches and therefore, similar adaptations. Obviously, there isn’t room for treatment of every species with a shared feature, so van Grouw describes the basic elements using a single species. Then she brings in descriptions of variations on that theme using both image and text. When you have finished reading the section and looking at the drawings you haven’t learned how to differentiate a Mallard from a scoter, but you know they are as different as they are similar. You can pick up an incredible cache of information if you want it, but that isn’t a requirement for enjoying the book.

Perhaps the one feature that distinguishes this collection of bird drawings from others is van Grouw’s ability to show how all these bones relate to each other in a live bird. Each skeleton exudes the nature – personality if you will allow it – of the species it is. You can feel the weight of a heavy bird like the Maribou Stork (p. 176); likewise the lack of it in the White-throated Hummingbird (p. 81). The Common Black-headed Gull (p. 151) has its bill open, its neck a little extended, and its wings a bit out and down. You can almost hear it complaining. The same is true for the Jackass Penguin (pp. 112-113) only its upside-down head is tucked under its belly as if it were braying at something low and behind it. These are very believable, active poses you are not going to find elsewhere. 

Van Grouw’s sense of humor adds to the mix, too. High on the list in this category is a skeleton Budgerigar (p. 57) perched on a dowel, not a branch, looking at itself in a mirror with an attached bell. I won’t try to explain it. It’s too deep and too funny all at the same time. There is also a Eurasian Sparrowhawk (p. 40), no feathers, with a Eurasian Collared Dove in its talons – caption: “Feathers removed and feathers being removed.” Priceless! 

Finally, the book ends with European Robin (p. 282) – dare I say “Cock Robin” – and he (it) is most assuredly dead. As dead, in fact, as all the others are alive. It’s as though van Grouw intended to accentuate the lack of life in this drawing just to point out how much of it there is on the preceding pages. The point was well made. All that remains is the index, but even there a Mallard is laughing at you to begin it and showing you its backside to end it. You get the feeling he’d stick out his tongue if he had one. It would be easy to dismiss this work as “just another coffee table book” if you didn’t look at anything but its size and shape. And certainly, it would serve well in that capacity, but there is much more to this volume than some pretty pictures and some words nobody will care to read. There is a synergy of element and effort in this work that produced a volume I will treasure for a long, long time. 

To Katrina van Grouw, I say bravo. And thank you. Now, get to work on the one with guts and gizzards. I can hardly wait. 

The Warbler Guide, Review by Joseph DiCostanzo

The Warbler Guide
Tom Stephenson and Scott Whittle, Drawings by Catherine Hamilton
Princeton University Press, 2013

The Warbler Guide joins an ever-growing list of reference guides aimed at aiding in the identification of single groups of birds. Seabirds, hawks, shorebirds, hummingbirds, pigeons, woodpeckers, and sparrows, to name just a few, have all had guides covering them published in the last twenty to thirty years. Some groups have had multiple treatments. Indeed, this is not the first treatment for New World warblers. That distinction probably goes to Warblers of the Americas: An Identification Guide by Jon Curson, David Quinn, and David Beadle (1994, Houghton Mifflin Co.), closely followed in time by Warblers by Jon Dunn and Kimball Garrett (1997, Houghton Mifflin Co.). Though both books were from the same publisher, the former covered the entire family including Central and South American species, while the latter (part of the Peterson Field Guides series) covered only species north of the Mexican border, as does the new Stephenson and Whittle book. 

The two earlier warbler guides followed an older field guide tradition of being illustrated exclusively, or nearly so, by paintings while the new guide uses photographs. I must confess to a longstanding bias towards artwork over photographs in field guides. 

However, the tremendous increase in the capability of photography with the advent of digital technology and the huge increase in the availability of quality photographs is forcing me to reevaluate my old biases, at least for some uses. I still think good artwork works best for the traditional field guide, especially for new birders and country wide guides. But for specialty guides focusing on specific groups such as this guide, the ability to present over a thousand photographs as this guide does, showing birds from many different angles demonstrates that photography is adding new dimensions to the identification guide. Artwork, however, is not completely obsolete. There are two pages (pp. 114-115) of drawings illustrating undertails by Catherine Hamilton as well as two pages of silhouettes (pp. 544-545) and probably hundreds of drawn icons. 

In its use of photographs this guide seems to me to be like the recent Crossley Guides (The Crossley Guide: Eastern Birds by Richard Crossley (2011) and The Crossley Guide: Raptors by Richard Crossley, Jerry Liguori, and Brian Sullivan (2013), both Princeton University Press). These books are attempting to give the birder the kind of broad experience with seeing birds from many angles and situations that in the past was only possible with years of field experience. While they can certainly help immensely with that goal there is still no substitute for actual time spent in the field. 

The first thing that needs to be said about this guide is that it is not a field guide! This is in no way meant as a criticism. I don’t think the authors intended birders to be carrying this guide around in their back pockets – it is just too big and heavy for that! It will, however, become I believe, a constantly used resource for the vast amount of information contained in it about warbler ID. The book begins with 130 pages of introductory material on the organization of the book, what to look for in identifying warblers, ageing and sexing warblers and the single largest section, learning and identifying warbler songs, chip notes and flight calls. The information is generally clearly presented and often extensively and well-illustrated. I did note a small handful of things that I thought were slips or odd choices. There is a well done and fairly extensive four page (pp. 12-15) “Topographic Tour” labeling the various parts and feather groups and the terms for them that will be important in understanding identification points in the main species accounts. However, four pages later in a section on “Facial contrast” the captions of the illustrations of Townsend’s and Blackthroated Green warblers refer to “auriculars”, but that term is not defined until p. 27. In the topography section the auriculars are labeled “cheek patch”. A similar mixing of terms occurs on p. 27 where in a photo of the head of a male Blackburnian Warbler it is described as having a “Distinctive triangular cheek patch” while on p. 28 a female Blackburnian is described with “dark facial marks form a triangular pattern”. I also found a couple of the choices of species to illustrate points to be a little odd. On p. 26 a photograph merely labeled “Redstart” is used to illustrate the behavior of flashing tail and wing feathers while feeding. The “Redstart” pictured is a Painted Redstart from the southwest. Why not use a picture of an American Redstart, a far more common and widespread bird that many birders will encounter? Similarly, on p. 30 the bird chosen to illustrate “eyelines” is a Golden-cheeked Warbler which has a limited range in Texas. Why not a Blue-winged Warbler, widespread in the eastern United States? These are I admit minor points and I have had enough experience with publishing that I suspect a number of these choices may have been made by photo editors, rather than the authors. 

The heart of the introductory material is the large section on warbler vocalizations. In teaching warbler songs, rather than the transliterations (i.e. a Yellow Warbler’s sweet, sweet, oh so sweet) used in most guides, the authors use sonograms, an illustrative method pioneered in field guides by Chandler Robbins, Bertel Bruun and Herbert Zim in their classic Birds of North America field guide (1966, Golden Press). However, Stephenson’s and Whittle’s use of sonograms is far more extensive and elaborate than in that earlier guide. Serious warbler students will want to download the companion audio files available for $5.99 from the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology’s Macaulay Library website at: macaulaylibrary.org/guide/the-warbler-guide.

The introductory material ends with an extensive set of usually double page “quick finder” charts to aid in rapidly narrowing down an identification of a warbler. There are spreads of photos of warbler faces, full profiles of side views, 45° angle views, underside views, and illustrations of spring and fall eastern warblers and one spread of western species. These are followed by the previously mentioned two pages of undertail drawings. Finally, in keeping with the authors stress on learning warbler vocalizations there are 22 pages of sonogram “finder charts” to help in narrowing down and identifying warbler songs, chip notes and flight calls. I cannot in this short review do justice to the authors’ extensive and truly impressive organization and presentation of this sonogram material. All of this is introductory to the extensive presentation of sonograms of warbler songs in each individual species account to be found in the main part of the book. The coverage of warbler vocalizations is truly the most ground-breaking part of this very impressive guide. 

The main part of the book is, of course the actual species accounts. Once again, the authors use an innovative approach in their arrangement of the species accounts. Rather than a traditional taxonomic sequence found in many guides or some arbitrary arrangement by color or habitat or some other chosen character, the species are arranged alphabetically by English name. When I saw this arrangement upon first opening the book I was prepared not to like it, being a traditionalist and usually favoring a taxonomic sequence, but the more I used the book the more I found the arrangement quite handy. There is a two-page (pp. 540-541) presentation of the current thinking on warbler taxonomy. 

The individual species accounts contain information on field marks, close-up photos of “Distinctive Views”, a section of “Additional Photos”, a section on “Comparison Species”, a section on ageing and sexing, range maps, and of course, an extensive presentation of sonograms of songs with comparisons to similar songs of other 

species. A problem I found with some of the range maps is that where a river forms the boundary between states, the river is shown, but not the heavier line of the state border. This can be confusing, especially along the Rio Grande on the Texas/Mexico border. 

At the back of the book are some pages on “Similar Non-warbler Species”, two pages on hybrid warblers (though Brewster’s and Lawrence’s, included here, already had a spread in the main species accounts), a quiz and review section, flight photos and discussion, charts of measurements and habitat and behavior information and a glossary. 

Two-page accounts for seven warbler species found only on the US/Mexico border (Crescent-chested, Fan-tailed, etc.) are included in the back of the book after the Yellow-throated Warbler account, though the Table of Contents in the front places them in alphabetical order with the rest. There is no mention that this is a section of border rarities. These seven accounts contain a glaring layout error: for each species the three “ Additional Photos” are unlabeled on the bottom of the first page of the write-up and the “Comparison Species” photos at the top of the second page are mislabeled as “Distinctive Views”. 

Overall, this is a very impressive guide and the few problems I have noted can be easily corrected in later printings or editions. 

More on the Warbler Guide

In my review of The Warbler Guide by Tom Stephenson and Scott Whittle (2013, Princeton University Press) in the October 2013 issue of the Linnaean News-Letter, I mentioned among the many features of the book a series of two page “quick finders” that compare various views of warblers. These “quick finders” are available online as free downloads from the website thewarblerguide.com. They are available in either PDF or JPG file formats. Also available for free download at the website is a PDF file of a four page guide to ageing and sexing of fall eastern warblers. In addition to thumbnail photographs illustrating various plumages and brief descriptions of the relevant marks to look for, the guide lists which species cannot be aged and/or sexed in the fall. 

After the October issue of the News-Letter came out, Linnaean member Rick Wright informed me of a major paper on warbler songs by Lynds Jones published in The Wilson Bulletin over a hundred years ago (Jones, L. 1900. Warbler Songs. Wilson Bulletin 12(1):156). As in the new Stephenson and Whittle guide, Jones attempted to simplify the learning of warbler songs by grouping the species by characteristics of the songs with no regard to the then accepted taxonomic arrangement of the warblers. Jones describes the songs of forty-six species, stating that “eleven species [have] yet to be studied.” The Jones paper can be downloaded at sora.unm.edu/node/3075. The paper is a fascinating look at the state of knowledge of warbler songs before the advent of modern aids such as recordings and sonograms. I thank Rick for bringing it to my attention. 

Birders: The Central Park Effect, Review by Helen Hays

Birders: The Central Park Effect
A Film by Jeffrey Kimball
Music Box Films, 2012

On occasion an individual has a vision coupled with the ability and drive to translate their vision into something we can all feel and understand. Jeffrey Kimball, Society member and former Council member, has done this in his excellent film Birders: The Central Park Effect. Jeff shot, wrote the narration, produced, and directed the film, scheduled to be shown at the Society’s meeting on January 8, 2013. Daniel Baer edited the film. Jeff’s wife, Pamela Hogan, and Tom Casciato are the executive producers. Since starting the film five years ago, Jeff has been totally committed to it. Working about half of each year on the film for the first four years, he took out a bank loan in the fifth year so he could work full time on the film and finish it.

In his film Jeff highlights the green habitat that is Central Park in the midst of Manhattan’s concrete pavements and buildings. It is an area for recreation for New Yorkers, as well as a valuable habitat for migrant and resident birds. Jeff concentrates on the birds and birders in Central Park. His camera work is excellent. His narration and dialogue lead the viewer though the park in different seasons of the year, underlining through remarks by the people birding in the park, what a wonderful habitat it is for birds and birders.

Jeff was born in San Francisco and grew up in the Bay area. In high school he played drums in a band, but said he didn’t have a sense of rhythm. He also tried acting, but felt self-conscious in front of a camera. He went to Stanford for his undergraduate work. The summer between high school and college was a turning point for him. He became aware that what he really wanted to do was go into film. That summer he discovered three films, among the many he watched, that he found fascinating: A Clockwork Orange, Casablanca, and Chinatown. He found a different thing interesting in each. In A Clockwork Orange he admired how the music and visuals were used to create a technical tour de force. Casablanca had a compelling story and in Chinatown the camera work and music were skillfully combined to create a mood. That fall he entered college and took a course in film aesthetics. Later his first film production course was in the making of documentaries.

At twenty-five Jeff came to New York to enter New York University for his Master of Fine Arts in film. He met his wife, Pamela Hogan, who makes documentaries, in the larger film community of New York City. While living and working in New York, Jeff still does a lot of work in California, returning to San Francisco several times a year. When he began working he worked in editing rooms for a variety of types of films before doing music for feature films. He organized the music for among others, Good Will Hunting, A Bronx Tale, Flirting with Disaster, and Swingers.

While in New York Jeff signed up for Joe DiCostanzo’s American Museum of Natural History bird walks in Central Park. He was delighted at the number of birds it was possible to see there every day. During the winter after he joined Joe’s walks, Chuck McAlexander called him and asked him if he wanted to go birding in the park in January. Jeff must have hesitated, because Chuck assured him you could see birds in Central Park in the winter. They saw twenty-six species that day. Again, Jeff was impressed and excited that here was a place in the middle of New York City where you could see birds any day of the year and both his wife and Tom Casciato told him he had reached a stage where he was in a position to make a movie on the birds of Central Park. And so it began…

Jeff knew he wanted to film many birds for his production, and thought he might have to film birds in other places, and then include them by noting that they were also found in Central Park. As he worked he found there was no need to film elsewhere and he took many beautiful shots of birds, all in Central Park. After two years he had enough footage of birds for the film and began filming people birding in Central Park. There were definitely talking points he hoped to bring out in interviewing birders in the park and wrote out questions before he met people to walk and talk in the park. Sometimes he was surprised by the answers he elicited. When I saw the film I was impressed by how articulate the people involved were, which, in part, is a tribute to Jeff’s skilled questioning in combination with excellent editing by Daniel Baer. Jeff said often the characters in the film came together in the editing room. All the people in the film sound natural and seem to be enjoying themselves.

In the first version of the film there was no narration. Those who attended a screening in 2011 thought narration would help to move visuals along, as for example, to make changes in seasons clear. Jeff world premiered his film at the South by Southwest Festival in Austin Texas in mid-March of 2012. HBO picked up the domestic TV rights to his film for a year. HBO will be premiering the film on July 16, 2012 at 9:00 pm. It will then be available on HBO On Demand. They have exclusive rights for six months and after that it can be shown on iTunes or available on DVD. A number of other groups have expressed an interest in Birder’s: The Central Park Effect, so stay tuned.

Jeff fits birding in when traveling with his family by birding early and returning in time to have breakfast with everyone. When his sixteen year old son, Ryder, saw Birder’s: The Central Park Effect, he said: “I get it, I get why you do it.” which pleased Jeff because he is concerned people understand the importance of parcels of land like Central Park and the value to humans and to wildlife in saving them. Jeff’s stepson, Aaron Profumo, will enter the Yale Drama School this fall, an exciting step for the whole family. Who knows, in the future Jeff and his stepson may meet on a set on opposite sides of the camera!

When Jeff finished Birders: The Central Park Effect he treated himself to a trip to Texas where he saw seventeen life birds.

As noted above, Geoffrey Nulle has scheduled a showing of Birders: The Central Park Effect for the Linnaean meeting on January 8, 2013. It is a documentary that has never been done before; a film you shouldn’t miss. Bring your friends. If they are not birders they will see an aspect of the park new to them. If they are birders they will appreciate Jeff’s focus on the park as a wonderful place for birds and birders, something to be valued and protected!