Jon L. Dunn & Jonathan Alderfer, Editors
It looks like an all time favorite has finally decided to go user friendlier, adding thumb tabs, a quick find index on each cover, one in taxonomic order the other in alphabetical order, and a more durable cover. This has always been one of the most popular of the field guides, especially among the more serious birders. These improvements will just make it all that much harder to chose a first field guide!
From the publisher: “...The Birds of North America will be the essential reference for field identification and the cornerstone of any birder's library. This is the ultimate, indispensable bird field guide—comprehensive, authoritative, portable, sturdy, and easier than ever to use.
Among the new edition's key elements and practical improvements: Every North American species—more than 960, including a new section on accidental birds—classified according to the latest official American Ornithologists' Union checklist; 4,000 full-color illustrations by the foremost bird artists at work today; newly updated range maps that draw on the latest data. New durable cover for added protection against adverse weather, plus informative quick-reference flaps that double as placemarkers New reader-friendly features like thumb tabs that make locating key sections faster and easier, and a quick-find index to direct users straight to the information they need.
About the authors:
Jon L. Dunn, a leading expert on the identification and distribution of North American birds, has served as chief consultant on all four previous editions of this book. He is also a consultant for the American Birding Association magazine, Birding, and the former chair of the ABA Checklist Committee, as well as a member of the California Bird Records Committee and the AOU Committee on Taxonomy and Nomenclature. He lives in Bishop, California.
Jonathan Alderfer, chief consultant for National Geographic's Birding Program, is a widely published author and field guide illustrator. One of the nation's foremost birding artists, he is well known for his expertise as a field ornithologist and an authority on North American birds. He was a general consultant, art consultant, and contributing artist for the NG Field Guide to the Birds of North America 3rd and 4th editions, and the lead editor of NG's Complete Birds of North America. A former Associate Editor of Birding, the ABA magazine, he also served on the Maryland/D.C. Bird Records Committee. He lives in Washington, D.C.”
Paper, 504 pages, 5 x 8 inches; full-color illustrations, range maps; fully revised and updated, November 2006, National Geographic Society."
