Product Description

Slim and affordable, FEEDER BIRDS OF EASTERN NORTH AMERICA features Roger Tory Peterson's classic art in a larger format designed especially for the eighty million North Americans who watch and feed birds. This easy-to-use, at-a-glance guide simplifies identification by including only the birds that frequent feeders. And to make it even more convenient, the most commonly seen birds come first, followed by those that are harder to identify or that rarely visit feeders. Range maps, descriptions of birds and foods that attract them, and illustrations are on facing pages, so identification is fast and easy. The brand-new introduction covers important bird-feeding topics, including types of feeders and where to place them, birdbaths, kinds of food and when to feed, plantings that attract birds, and solutions to problems with squirrels and cats. A handy quick-reference list tells what kind of food each species prefers, and a feeder checklist provides a record of birds as they are seen.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #222130 in Books
• Brand: Peterson Books
• Published on: 2000-04-14
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 112 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780618059447
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

About the Author
Roger Tory Peterson (1908-1996) received the Presidential Medal of Freedom and every major award in ornithology, natural history, and conservation. His books, including the Peterson Field Guides, have sold over ten million copies. The Penguin Pavilion at the Mystic Marine Life Aquarium, in Mystic, Connecticut, was recently named in his honor.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
When to Feed Birds
Perhaps the most frequently asked questions about feeding
birds concern when to feed them. When should I start feeding? When
should I stop so I don"t affect migration? Can I feed in the summer?
Several issues must be considered.
People feed birds in order to enjoy them, so why not
feed them all year long? As long as you"re willing to put in the time
to maintain the feeding area — supply food and water and keep the
area clean — you will be rewarded by birds using the site. You may
not get the variety in the summer that you"ll see during migration or
in the winter when there is more of a dependency on the feeder, but
you may be rewarded with the antics of young birds being introduced
to the site.
Birds can become dependent on feeders for
supplemental food. It has been shown, however, that they do not rely
on feeders for all of their food and perhaps not even a quarter of
what they eat. That said, though, the feeder can be an important
resource during times of duress. When severe snowstorms blanket wild
food supplies, the birds will turn to the feeder they have come to
know as a food resource. It is during these times of stress that the
feeder plays its most vital role. Do not let them down at this point!
If it is a storm of long duration, the feeding station may mean the
difference of life for some of the more physiologically unprepared
birds. The feeder helps many a bird through the hard times, so it is
important to be faithful to your feeding once you start.
As for the question of affecting migration by holding
the birds at the feeder so that they will not go north to breed or
south for the winter, the answer is that birds are not controlled by
food. Once the hormones for breeding begin to flow, they head north,
and once the drive for migrating south takes hold, off they go, no
matter how much food is available. If a species that normally does
not stay for the summer or winter remains at the feeder, it is more
than likely a young bird that does not have the proper hormonal
impulse to migrate or an older bird that simply can no longer make
extensive journeys. You are not affecting the breeding or migrant
population of the birds of the United States by feeding.

Customer Reviews

Feeder birds without page turning
This is more or less a rehash of the peterson field guide. It has the same (enlarged) pictures that are in the original guide. In addition, it has the type of food that each bird is likely to eat as well as the range map next to the description. I suppose it's a little convenient to have all the feeder birds grouped together, but , other than that, I felt disappointed with the book. There was some (but not enough) information on actually attracting birds and setting up feeding stations. Personally, I found the Stoke's guide to attracting, identifying and understanding feeder birds to be more helpful.

Handy convenient book
I bought this book as a gift for my elderly parents who like to use a guide for identifying birds at their backyard feeder. It has large, colorful pictures that are nice for that purpose. This book was recommended by a local newspaper writer who writes a "bird" column weekly. I am happy with my purchase and so are my parents.

Useful and not intimidating
I like this book. It is inexpensive and easy to read. It is not an extensive resource for every single bird one might see, but that's not why I got it. There are lots of big heavy field guides. This one has birds by family or type on each page, with notes about what they like to eat. In the front it has short sections about types of feeders, food, plants, predators, etc., and they are nice and short with lots of white space, so they are easy to read and there is room for notes in the margins.

Then there is a short section about how to look at birds for identification... with black and white drawings to illustrate what is meant by how they fly and what are wing bars, crowns, etc. Then there is a handy quick reference list of common species and their preferred foods, and finally it gets into the color photo section of birds by family, with short descriptions and range maps.

There are apparently other books of this type, but this was the only one they had at Barnes & Noble the day I was shopping, and I am very pleased with it. After I read a bit of this book, and "All the Backyard Birds: East," a pocket type guide by the American Bird Conservancy, I quickly rigged a rudimentary platform feeder and plan to build or buy a better one. We have a few different kinds of feeders but it was educational to see how many additional species might be attracted to the platform type.