Vanishing Songbirds: The Sixth Order : Wood Warblers and Other Passerine Birds (Constance Sullivan Book)
One of the premier photographers of our time, Porter (1901-90) consorted with Alfred Stieglitz and Ansel Adams and was a pioneer in nature photography. This book is a selection of 160 stop-action color photographs of American songbirds at their nests. Just finding these nests, much less securing arresting photographs of their occupants in action, is a major accomplishment. Owing to tropical deforestation and habitat destruction in North America, many of these species, especially the so-called neotropical migrants, are in alarming decline. Amazing as these photographs are, the use of flash and harsh light does give many of them a frozen, dioramalike quality, as if they were taken at night. The text, mostly annotations of the photos by Kenn Kaufman, an outstanding contemporary ornithologist, is excellent. For larger natural history and photography collections.?Henry T. Armistead, Free Lib. of PhiladelphiaCopyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.