Summer Nature Video Highlights

This summer I've spent a bit of time shooting high-definition video. I am a rank beginner and learning as I go, but it's been an incredibly fun new hobby.

So here is a handful of five-second snippets from the hours of video I've shot (most of which is undeniably deletable). I am saving a few choice clips for later sharing here and elsewhere, though it's tempting to let it all out at once.

I think my dream job would be to be the person who gets to film those "Charles Kuralt nature moments." No voice over, no on-screen graphics—just the imagery and natural sounds of some amazing phenomena: birds, animals, plants, or landscape. I remember his segments so clearly from the CBS Sunday Morning television show.

I hope you like my little montage of clips. There's lots more to come. Thanks for watching.

Caption Contest #16

When I lead field trips at birding festivals, I often snap photos of the group on the bus. I'm not sure why—it just happens, I guess. This photo comes from last spring's New River Birding and Nature Festival in Fayetteville, WV. I believe it was on the High Country tour, where we go forth seeking warblers.

It struck me as a good one for a BOTB caption contest. So let your freak flag fly and send your most cleverest caption in by midnight, Sunday, September 12, 2010 using the comment window below. The winner will receive a genuine BWD lens cloth (a $5 value!) which works great for cleaning optics, eyeglasses, cellphones, or the Cheeto-stained screen on your iPad.

Good luck and we'll see you on the bus.

My New Book!

My newest book was several years in the making. Now, it's finally here (and I believe it's also in both "bricks" and "clicks" bookstores everywhere). The title is Identifying and Feeding Birds, and it's just published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

As poet, guitar god, and nature lover Jerry Garcia once sang: "What a long, strange trip it's been." So true, so true. And yes, we've forgiven Jerry for pronouncing nuthatch as "nut-thatch" in the Grateful Dead song "Eyes of the World."

Back to the book: It's my attempt at delivering, in a fun-loving way, all the necessary info for attracting, feeding, and identifying backyard birds in North America. It's based upon my nearly 40 years of feeding birds—every minute of which I've enjoyed (even while making truly stupid mistakes). I'm hoping the reader can learn from my experience and leapfrog straight to doing bird feeding right with maximum enjoyment.

But you, my fellow book-reading consumers will decide if this particular book succeeds in its goal.

Identifying and Feeding Birds is the first book in a multi-title series I'm working on for Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. The second book, Hummingbirds and Butterflies, co-written with Connie Toops is currently in the publisher's Easy-Bake Oven and should be out in spring 2011.

As an aside, it's NEVER a good idea to put a Stretch Armstrong through your little sister's Easy-Bake Oven. See, this is the kind of beneficial advice you can get from me.

If you feed birds and want to do it better, or if you're just thinking about starting, here's a list of reasons to buy my new book:

1. People a lot smarter than I am think the book is pretty good.
2. Feeding birds is good for you. Ask your doctor.
3. My sister made me confess to the Stretch Armstrong/Easy-Bake Oven crime.
4. I debunk all the bird-feeding myths that have puzzled you for decades.
5. In the book I share my family's heirloom suet-dough recipe, which is lard-based.
6. You'll learn obscure facts, like the one about Jerry Garcia's nut-thatch mispronunciation.
7. It costs just $14.95, which is less than you'll spend in a single Starbucks visit.
8. I'm proud that it's part of the legendary Peterson Field Guide Series.
9. It contains revealing "Behind the Music" profiles of 125+ backyard bird species.
10. While you're at it, why not buy two?

Thank you for lending me your eyeballs over the past several years here at Bill of the Birds. I always endeavor to make your time here well spent (or to trick you into feeling that way). However, there may be occasional subliminal messages that slip through my fingers. These messages will encourage you to read more blog posts, to watch more birds, to go to birding festivals, to have more fun as a birder and human, and to buy my books. Sorry, but I cannot help myself.

Despite what this photo may indicate, my new book is NOT currently available in a backwards version.

Did I mention that I have a new book out?