A wayward boy finds his calling in birds
If you’re a parent, you might want to turn the page before
reading further.
Imagine that your son announces that he’s dropping out of high
school to hit the road, and that he intends to hitchhike
– jobless – around the country in order to learn more about
birds.
Birds!
A wayward boy finds his calling in birds
If you’re a parent, you might want to turn the page before reading further.
Imagine that your son announces that he’s dropping out of high school to hit the road, and that he intends to hitchhike – jobless – around the country in order to learn more about birds.
Birds!
The boy – as teenagers are wont to do – will not listen to reason. He’s nearly penniless. But the home situation is rocky anyway, and the boy is determined.
He’s armed with a small knapsack, sleeping bag and some cheap, very used binoculars.
And he’s off, sleeping under bridges, and even making ends meet by eating pet food for long stretches.
I’ve just written the perfect recipe for sleepless nights for any parent.
This is not a hypothetical story. Fortunately, it’s got a happy ending.
The young adventurer I just described is Kenn Kaufman, who grew to become one of the most influential and generous forces in American birding.
Today, he is very much in demand as a speaker. He’s the author of several books.
One of his volumes, “Kingbird Highway,” tells the story of his teenage sojourn. It’s a great read, kind of a Jack Kerouac meets Roger Tory Peterson story, but one that should appeal even to people who don’t give birds a second thought.
Kaufman also is the author of my favorite field guide for beginning birders. It’s the one most likely to be in my back pocket when I carry a guide into the field. “Birds of North America,” a Kaufman Focus Guide, is compact, well organized, with a quick index in the back, and packed with good tips. It does not look flashy, which is the only reason a beginning birder would be likely to overlook it.
Most people who begin to wonder what those things visiting the backyard feeders are actually called land in a bookstore. And most make the same mistake. They buy a guide built around beautiful color photos.
One of the most popular guides goes so far as to organize the birds listed within not by taxonomic groups, but by color.
The guide has great curb appeal, but it’s virtually useless.
First, the color of birds varies greatly, just as the color of people does. My favorite field guide of all is by David Allen Sibley. It’s comprehensive, but a little too big to carry around comfortably all day. Sibley devotes a full two pages just to paintings of red-tailed hawks because they are so variable.
Thus, grouping birds by color is the shortest path to confusion. Consider house finches – a ubiquitous backyard bird. Most makes wear bright red feathers, but a few are the color of school buses.
Kaufman’s compact little book organizes birds in logical groups. Most people know what a gull looks like. Seeing an unfamiliar gull, a reader knows where to begin looking. Moreover, Kaufman created images that represent the typical features of each bird species, rather than photographs depicting a single bird.
While Sibley painted each of the 30,000 images in his field guide, Kaufman used photos, but then used the technology available in the Adobe PhotoShop computer program to create the “average” bird.
The result is stunning in its simplicity and utility. I find that good field guides are like good mates – their best qualities manifest themselves over time. Kaufman’s work makes a fine companion for the long haul. And its reach has just expanded with the publication of his first Spanish language edition.
And, when I pick up the book, it’s comforting to think about the high school dropout with wanderlust and what he became.
Perhaps – just perhaps – I worry a little less about our daughters, thanks to the adolescent adventures of Kenn Kaufman.
