Until now there has been no single, comprehensive resource on the status of North America's most threatened birds and what people can do to help protect them. Birder's Conservation Handbook is the only book of its kind, written specifically to help birders and researchers understand the threats while providing actions to protect birds and their habitats. Jeffrey Wells has distilled vast amounts of essential information into a single easy-to-use volume-required reading for anyone who loves birds and wants to ensure they are protected. At-a-glance species accounts cover in detail North America's one hundred most at-risk birds; each account is beautifully illustrated by today's top bird artists. The text includes status, distribution, ecology, threats, conservation actions and needs, and references. A distribution map accompanies each entry. Chapters discuss birds as indicators of environmental health, the state of North American bird populations, major conservation issues, and initiatives now underway to improve the health of North America's birds. Birder's Conservation Handbook is an indispensable resource for birdwatchers, researchers, naturalists, and conservationists. Reading it will inspire you to become an active steward of our birds and the habitats we share. A comprehensive guide to North America's one hundred most at-risk birds and how to protect them Compact and easy to use, with beautiful illustrations and data organized for convenient, at-a-glance reference Detailed species accounts, including distribution maps Practical advice on conservation Information on leading conservation agencies and resources

“A wonderful book that highlights the globally unique and important boreal forest ecoregion from an avian perspective, with fresh twists. Your ideas about where those migrant and wintering birds in your backyards have come from will be forever changed after you read this.”--Gordon Orians, Professor Emeritus of Biology, University of Washington “One of the planet's most amazing spectacles is the seasonal ebb and flow of migrants from the boreal forests to warmer winter quarters, with stopovers in our neighborhoods in between. This book tells you how connected the world is and what's at risk if we damage any part of it.”--Stuart Pimm, Doris Duke Professor of Conservation Ecology, Duke University, winner of the 2006 Dr. A. H. Heineken Prize “This diverse set of contributions about birds that nest in and migrate to and from North America's boreal forest demonstrates the remarkable interconnectedness of ecosystems across the hemispheres and the incredible responsibility we face to protect them.”--Bridget Stutchbury, York University, author of Silence of the Songbirds and The Private Lives of Birds “The fact that billions of birds breed in North America’s boreal forest is amazing enough, but this assemblage is even more remarkable when understood as playing completely different, major ecological roles across the temperate and tropical Americas during the northern winter. This book definitely will broaden your thinking about ecological connections across the hemisphere and the global-scale phenomenon that crosses our skies twice each year.”--John W. Fitzpatrick, Louis Agassiz Fuertes Director, Cornell Lab of Ornithology

Whether we live in cities, in the suburbs, or in the country, birds are ubiquitous features of daily life, so much so that we often take them for granted. But even the casual observer is aware that birds don’t fill our skies in the number they once did. That awareness has spawned conservation action that has led to notable successes, including the recovery of some of the nation’s most emblematic species, such as the Bald Eagle, Brown Pelican, Whooping Crane, and Peregrine Falcon. Despite this, a third of all American bird species are in trouble—in many cases, they’re in imminent danger of extinction. The most authoritative account ever published of the threats these species face, The American Bird Conservancy Guide to Bird Conservation will be the definitive book on the subject. The Guide presents for the first time anywhere a classification system and threat analysis for bird habitats in the United States, the most thorough and scientifically credible assessment of threats to birds published to date, as well as a new list of birds of conservation concern. Filled with beautiful color illustrations and original range maps, the Guide is a timely, important, and inspiring reference for birders and anyone else interested in conserving North America’s avian fauna. But this book is far more than another shout of crisis. The Guide also lays out a concrete and achievable plan of long-term action to safeguard our country’s rich bird life. Ultimately, it is an argument for hope. Whether you spend your early weekend mornings crouched in silence with binoculars in hand, hoping to check another species off your list, or you’ve never given much thought to bird conservation, you’ll appreciate the visual power and intellectual scope of these pages.

The foremost experts on the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation come together to discuss its role in the rescue, recovery, and future of our wildlife resources. At the end of the nineteenth century, North America suffered a catastrophic loss of wildlife driven by unbridled resource extraction, market hunting, and unrelenting subsistence killing. This crisis led powerful political forces in the United States and Canada to collaborate in the hopes of reversing the process, not merely halting the extinctions but returning wildlife to abundance. While there was great understanding of how to manage wildlife in Europe, where wildlife management was an old, mature profession, Continental methods depended on social values often unacceptable to North Americans. Even Canada, a loyal colony of England, abandoned wildlife management as practiced in the mother country and joined forces with like-minded Americans to develop a revolutionary system of wildlife conservation. In time, and surviving the close scrutiny and hard ongoing debate of open, democratic societies, this series of conservation practices became known as the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation. In this book, editors Shane P. Mahoney and Valerius Geist, both leading authorities on the North American Model, bring together their expert colleagues to provide a comprehensive overview of the origins, achievements, and shortcomings of this highly successful conservation approach. This volume • reviews the emergence of conservation in late nineteenth–early twentieth century North America • provides detailed explorations of the Model's institutions, principles, laws, and policies • places the Model within ecological, cultural, and socioeconomic contexts • describes the many economic, social, and cultural benefits of wildlife restoration and management • addresses the Model's challenges and limitations while pointing to emerging opportunities for increasing inclusivity and optimizing implementation Studying the North American experience offers insight into how institutionalizing policies and laws while incentivizing citizen engagement can result in a resilient framework for conservation. Written for wildlife professionals, researchers, and students, this book explores the factors that helped fashion an enduring conservation system, one that has not only rescued, recovered, and sustainably utilized wildlife for over a century, but that has also advanced a significant economic driver and a greater scientific understanding of wildlife ecology. Contributors: Leonard A. Brennan, Rosie Cooney, James L. Cummins, Kathryn Frens, Valerius Geist, James R. Heffelfinger, David G. Hewitt, Paul R. Krausman, Shane P. Mahoney, John F. Organ, James Peek, William Porter, John Sandlos, James A. Schaefer

This edition has 65 new images, making a total of 500. The original configurations were altered so that there is only one species per plate. The text is a revision of the Ornithological Biography, rearranged according to Audubon's Synopsis of the Birds of North America (1839).