{"title":"Tim Birkhead","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eTim Birkhead\u003c\/strong\u003e offers a captivating exploration of the avian world, blending scientific insight with engaging storytelling. His works, such as \u003cem\u003eThe Great Auk\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eBirds and Us\u003c\/em\u003e, reveal the intricate relationships between birds and humans, inviting readers to appreciate the natural wonders around them.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eWhether aimed at curious adults or younger audiences, including titles like \u003cem\u003eWhat it's Like to be a Bird\u003c\/em\u003e, Birkhead's books bring nature to life with clarity and warmth. Readers can expect vivid observations that illuminate bird behaviour and ecology in accessible and thought-provoking ways.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"birds-and-us-by-tim-birkhead-9780241990131","title":"Birds and Us","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA sweeping and lyrical history of the relationship between birdlife and humankind over twelve millennia, exploring how birds have captured our imaginations and inspired our culture and our science.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn \u003cem\u003eBirds and Us\u003c\/em\u003e, award-winning writer and ornithologist Tim Birkhead takes us on an epic and dazzling journey through this mutual history with birds, from the ibises mummified and deified by Ancient Egyptians to Renaissance experiments on woodpecker anatomy, from Victorian obsessions with egg collecting to the present fight to save endangered species and restore their habitats.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eWeaving in stories from his own life as a scientist, including far-flung expeditions to wondrous Neolithic caves in Spain and the bustling guillemot colonies of the Faroe Islands, this rich and fascinating book is the culmination of a lifetime's research and unforgettably shows how birds shaped us, and how we have shaped them.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Penguin Random House NZ","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46342566052076,"sku":"9780241990131","price":29.0,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/3614853482274.jpg?v=1743920656"},{"product_id":"what-its-like-to-be-a-bird-by-tim-birkhead-9781526604125","title":"What it's Like to be a Bird","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e'This beautiful book is one to treasure forever' David Walliams, comedian and children's author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWINNER of The Margaret Mallett Award for Children's Non-Fiction 2022\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHave you ever wondered what it would be like to fly? Or to live high in the tree tops? Or perhaps you’ve wondered what birds do when no one is looking? \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBirds have some of the most extraordinary – and peculiar – behaviours on the planet. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eRavens love PLAYING games. In winter, they sledge down snow-covered rooftops on their bellies, getting faster and faster. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePartridges are SNEAKY and know just how to trick hungry foxes. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd honeyguides are HELPFUL. They help humans to find the sweetest treat in the forest – honey. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThese are just some of the incredible stories you’ll read in this book. With fascinating factual detail and playful storytelling from ornithologist Tim Birkhead and vibrant, personality-filled illustrations from Cat Rayner, this book captures what it’s \u003ci\u003ereally\u003c\/i\u003e like to be a bird.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Allen \u0026 Unwin","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46996623884524,"sku":"9781526604125","price":32.99,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/30f6756d489599024f78068a0ed567bf.jpg?v=1763149047"},{"product_id":"the-great-auk-by-tim-birkhead-9781399415750","title":"The Great Auk","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Great Auk\u003c\/em\u003e was a goose-sized seabird superbly adapted for underwater flight. Unable to fly, it was effectively the penguin of the north, diving deep to exploit vast shoals of herring and mackerel. The summer months saw Great Auks massed together in vast, bustling colonies. Prior to the appearance of humans, their lives were idyllic: three months ashore to breed, the rest of the time riding the ocean waves.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe Europeans who first found the Great Auks’ New World breeding colonies in the 1600s couldn’t believe their luck. Seabird colonies like Funk Island, off north-east Newfoundland, became fast food restaurants for hungry sailors. After eight weeks at sea on a diet of salt pork and hardtack, mariners gorged themselves on the liver-flavoured flesh of Great Auks. Unafraid of humans, Great Auks were easily captured and killed. \u003ci\u003eIt was as if God has made the innocency [innocence] of so poor a creature, to become such an admirable instrument for the sustenance of man,\u003c\/i\u003e wrote Captain Richard Whitbourne. Fat, fleshy, and flush with feathers, Great Auks soon became desirable commodities for mariners in the fifteenth century and beyond.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eFor more than two centuries mariners continued to plunder Great Auk islands, killing birds and crushing their eggs underfoot. As Margaret Atwood has said: \u003ci\u003eWe’re ankle-deep in blood, and all because we ate the birds, we ate them a long time ago, when we still had the power to say no.\u003c\/i\u003e Almost no one said ‘no’. One who did was Captain George Cartwright who, on seeing boatloads of Great Auk bodies brought ashore from Funk Island in the 1780s, wrote: \u003ci\u003eIf a stop is not soon put to that practice, the whole breed will be diminished to almost nothing, particularly the penguins [great auks]: for this is now the only island they have left to breed upon.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eTwenty years later, the Great Auk had disappeared from Funk Island. A few hundred birds hung on in Iceland. But not for long. A boom in bird studies in the early 1800s saw both private individuals and museums desperately seeking specimens. No sooner had the Icelandic birds become known, a scramble for their skins and eggs began. It was a ruthless, bloody, unthinking destruction of one of the world’s most extraordinary birds. The last two Great Auks ever seen were killed in early June 1844.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eBut it wasn’t the end, for the Great Auk has had the most extraordinary afterlife. Scarcity breeds obsession and Great Auk skins, eggs, and skeletons became the focus for dozens of collectors. This becomes a story of pathological craving and dodgy dealings involving vast sums of money. Almost two hundred years after the bird became extinct this passion is undiminished, and just two weeks ago (as I write) a Great Auk egg sold at Sotheby’s for more than £100,000.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThis book is the story of the Great Auk’s life before man, its death in Iceland on that fateful day in June 1844, and the unrelenting subsequent quest for its remains. The author, Tim Birkhead, has studied guillemots and razorbills, the Great Auk’s closest living relatives, for more than fifty years. His research on the Great Auk itself has revealed previously unimagined aspects of its life and also, unexpectedly, its afterlife; in a curious twist of fate, Birkhead found himself the recipient of the archive of a man who accumulated more Great Auk skins and eggs than anyone else. The correspondence of this man — the eccentric millionaire Vivian Hewitt — casts an astonishing and exciting light on the often-shady business of Great Auk remains.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eSince 1950 over seventy percent of the world’s seabirds have been lost through human activity. The Great Auk was the first – an all-powerful symbol of human folly and the necessity of conservation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Allen \u0026 Unwin Aotearoa New Zealand","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48318059774188,"sku":"9781399415750","price":29.99,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/9781399415750-the-great-auk-1.jpg?v=1788752295"}],"url":"https:\/\/bookhero.live\/collections\/tim-birkhead.oembed","provider":"Book Hero","version":"1.0","type":"link"}