Name: The Thing with Feathers
ISBN: 9781594486357

Noah K. Strycker

An associate editor for Birding draws on his expertise in a range of extreme environments to offer insights into bird behavior and intelligence, from the flocking abilities of starlings to the memories of nutcrackers, while revealing the unexpected intimate coexistence between birds and humans.

The Surprising Lives of Birds and what They Reveal about Being Human

The Thing with Feathers

rumbledethumps

In the introduction, Strycker sums up what the book is about. "This book may be about the bird world, but it's also about the human world. Birds can behave in curious, flashy, and startling ways, but they seek the same basic things we do: foods, shelter, territory, safety, companionship, a legacy."

Each chapter examines  a bird behavior (the ability of Clark's Nutcrackers to create mental maps, the monogamy of the albatross), and often relates this trait to human behaviors. While some may think this smacks of anthropomorphism, Strycker does an excellent job in examining the latest in ornithology and human neurology in order to ask whether some of our own behavior might be biological in origin.

The study of birds will be fascinating to any birder, and the glimpse at human nature will interest any student of humanity.

The Thing with Feathers The Surprising Lives of Birds and what They Reveal about Being Human

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