Good. Birds, everywhere; that’s what’s wanted. It had been a year since the night of the black-backed gull flying past Emily’s downtown balcony, a year since I first became aware of another kind of New Zealand – these bird islands, this birdland. It was full to bursting with a life I had never known about.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
To Graham Turbott, Geoff Moon, Gwenda Pulham, Adrian Riegen, Brian Gill, Sav Saville, and John Simmons of the Ornithological Society of New Zealand (new members welcome) for their advice, patience and warmth. To the editor of The Sunday Star-Times, Cate Brett, for her indulgence, and to readers who responded to my bird columns in Sunday magazine. To John Naughton and Hilary Pennington at the Wolfson College Press Fellowship in Cambridge University for their support, and to Jaquelina Jimena, Massimo Ragnedda, Ital De-Valera Botchway, Sandrine Baume, Matt Edmonds, Luis Poulter, head porter David Luhrs and the kitchen staff at Wolfson College, where their friendship meant a lot during the writing of much of this book. To writers Neil Cross, Charlotte Grimshaw and Paula Morris for their literary encouragement. Above all, literally, to the swirling presence of birds, especially the white-faced heron.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The 1826 Journal of John James Audobon: University of Oklahoma Press, 1967
99 New Zealand Birds, Don Hadden: Caxton Press, 1990
The Animals of New Zealand, Captain F.W. Hutton and James Drummond: Whitcombe and Tombs, 1923
The Big Year, Mark Obmascik: Doubleday, 2004
A Biology of Birds, Barrie Heather: Ornithological Society of New Zealand, 1966
Bird Islands of New Zealand, Robert Wilson: Whitcombe and Tombs, 1959
Bird Secrets, Major G.A. Buddle: Reed, 1951
Bird Watching and Bird Behaviour, Julian Huxley: Dobson, 1930
Birders: Tales of a Tribe, Mark Cocker: Viking, 2002
The Birds Around Us, R.H.D. Stidolph: Hedley’s Bookshop Ltd, 1971
Birds in New Zealand, C.J.R. Robertson: Reed, 1974
Birds of New Zealand Locality Guide, Stuart Chambers: Arun Books, 2000
Birds of New Zealand, Alfred M. Bailey: Denver Museum of Natural History, 1955
Birds of the Water, Wood and Waste, Herbert Guthrie-Smith: Whitcombe and Tombs, 1927
A Book of Birds and Beasts, Dorothy Margaret Stuart: Methuen, 1957
Buller’s Birds of New Zealand, ed. E.G. Turbott: Whitcombe and Tombs, 1967
Extinct Birds of New Zealand, Alan Tennyson and Paul Martinson: Te Papa Press, 2006
Field Guide to the Birds of New Zealand, Barrie Heather and Hugh Robertson: Oxford University Press, 1997; revised edition: Penguin, 2005
A Field Guide to the Birds of New Zealand, R.A. Falla, R.B. Sibson and E.G. Turbott: Collins, 1966
Focus on New Zealand Birds, Geoff Moon: Cameo Press, 1957
In Search of Birds in New Zealand, Ross McKenzie: Reed, 1972
A History of the Birds of New Zealand, Sir Walter Buller: Cambridge University library copy, 1888
The Life Histories of New Zealand Birds, Edgar Stead: Search Publishing, 1932
The Life of the Robin, David Lack: Pelican, 1953
More New Zealand Bird Portraits, M.F. Soper: Whitcombe and Tombs, 1965
Native Birds in New Zealand, Charles Masefield: Reed, 1948
New Zealand Bird Life, E.G. Turbott: Reed, 1947
New Zealand Birds and How to Identify Them, Pérrine Moncrieff: Whitcombe and Tombs, 1923
New Zealand Birds in Focus, Geoff Moon: Reed, 2005
New Zealand Birds, W.R.B. Oliver: Fine Arts, 1930
New Zealand Land of Birds, Geoff Moon: New Holland, 2001
Notornis, Volumes 1–52, 1940–2006
Paintings of the Birds of New Zealand, J.G. Keulemans: Random House, 2006
Pyramid Valley, Roger Duff: Pegasus Press, 1952
RSPB Birds of Britain and Europe, Rob Hume: Dorling Kindersley, 2002
The Shell Bird Book, James Fisher: Ebury Press, 1966
This Birding Life, Stephen Moss: Aurum Press, 2006
The Travelling Naturalist Around New Zealand, Brian Parkinson: Century Hutchinson, 1989
THE PHOTOGRAPHS
One of the heroes of this book is Major Geoffrey Buddle. Awarded the Distinguished Service Order, the Military Cross and the White Eagle of Serbia for his bravery in World War I, he was gassed in France and not expected to live when he returned to New Zealand. But he survived, and travelled with his friends Edgar Stead and Major Rodney Wilson to study birds in some of the most remote corners of New Zealand. Buddle died in 1951, the year that A.H. & A.W. Reed published his exquisite book of photography, Bird Secrets. Many of the photographs reproduced in this book come from that classic work. The other photographs are also held in the Buddle Collection at Auckland Museum. Faded, bewitching, timeless, the photographs reveal his lifelong love of birds. The captions are as he wrote them.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
STEVE BRAUNIAS is a senior writer and columnist with The Sunday Star-Times, and winner of numerous national journalism awards. Fool’s Paradise, his book of selected columns, won Best First Book of Non-Fiction at the 2002 Montana Book Awards. He has been the editor of Capital Times, feature writer at Metro, deputy editor at the Listener, and is a contributing writer to TV One’s Eating Media Lunch and The Unauthorised History of New Zealand.
Red-billed Gull following the yacht off the North Cape, 6.1.47
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