For all those of you in the U.S., Canada, and the Philippines who upon hearing of the publication earlier this year of Tim Birkhead’s new Birds and Us: A 12,000-Year History from Cave Art to Conservation by Viking in the U.K. immediately began asking “When will we have an opportunity to buy a copy of this book in our own respective countries?” I bring good tidings from Princeton University Press. They have their edition of Birds and Us ready to be officially released on August 9th.
For most anyone interested in birds, Prof. Birkhead really needs no introduction; his decades of work in the fields of animal behavior, evolution, and ornithology stand by themselves, and his public outreach via both print and broadcast media presenting upon the subject of birds and their lives have brought opportunities for an increased understanding of these fascinating creatures to millions of people all around the world.
In this most recent addition to his long bibliography, Prof. Birkhead takes up the history of humans and the interest we have had in birds since the beginnings of recorded history. From the ancients through the Middle Ages and right up to the present day, he examines how we have depicted, interpreted, and interacted with birds across a range of activities spanning from the religious to the scientific. And, as birds are – like so many other forms of life on Earth – increasingly now imperiled by recent dramatic changes to the environment, he also takes up the conservation activities that are the most recent (and it is hoped) not the final chapter in our long interwoven history with the Class Aves.
