Lars Jonsson´s boring birds

"Birds of Wood, Park and Garden" is the first volume of a five-volume work, covering all birds of Europe. This volume is intended as a field guide to the birds of woodlands and parklands in Europe north of the Alps but south of the boreal forest zone. In other words, the usual boring feathered critters hopping around outside my window...or at least further out in "my" strolling area. They are all in there: house sparrow, tree sparrow, fieldfare, blackbird, green woodpecker, wood pigeon and the super-abundant corvids. Gee, I constantly have to remind myself that these are supposed to be close evolutionary cousins of the T-rex, lest I surely die of boredom! Only the bluecrow and the hoopoe stand out but, alas, they never seem to show up outside my apartment building...

The Swedish edition of this book was the first thing ever published by Lars Jonsson, the famous Swedish bird painter. He was only 24 years old! The text, penned by Jonsson himself, sounds extremely mature, so I always assumed the author was at least in his fifties... Jonsson's illustrations are, of course, excellent but still feel "rough" compared to his later forages into bird painting. I don't wish to sound ungrateful to the Master, but this basic-basic bird guide somehow didn't rock my world in the way Jonsson's later works tend to do. Therefore, I only give it three stars. Still, it is strange that Jonsson was flunked by the Swedish Art Academy. What did they want him to do, a Pollock?!

Not so ugly ducklings

A review of Lars Jonsson´s "Birds of Lake, River, Marsh and Field" 

This is the third volume in a five-volume series of field guides written and illustrated by Lars Jonsson. This volume covers typical birds found in or around lakes, rivers, marshlands and agricultural landscapes. The geographical range is Northern and Central Europe, north of the Alps but south of the "taiga". Ducks, shorebirds, grebes and rails are prominently featured, as are assorted passerines. We also get to meet the crane, the kingfisher and the swift.

Personally, I think that this series is rather idiosyncratic. Birds are not usually connected to a distinctive biotope, I mean they do fly! I'm pretty sure you can find a lot of birds around the average European lake not included in this slender little volume. Indeed, Jonsson later published a one-in-all volume called "Birds of Europe", covering the entire continent from Iceland to the Bosphorus.

However, as a work of art in its own right or a birthday gift to a bird-lover, even the third volume of the original series works just fine. These ducklings sure aint ugly! Four stars.

King Fisher the Great

A review of "Kingfisher: Tales from the Halcyon River" by Charlie Hamilton James

I leafed through this book at the museum store the other day. This is some kind of kingfisher extra-extravaganza. Yes, it's an entire book featuring colour photographs of the one and only Common Kingfisher (Alcedo atthis). One chapter also shows other kingfishers, including the Pied Kingfisher. But most of the attention is given to "our", European species. I'm not sure how to rate this book - I don't mind kingfishers, but I'm not a complete Alcedines fanatic either. One thing is clear, however. Charlie Hamilton James is hereby dubbed King Fisher the Great!

Lars Jonsson´s first book

Believe it or not, but this is Lars Jonsson's first book, the original Swedish edition of "Birds of Wood, Park and Garden". It was published in Sweden in 1976, and is both written and illustrated by Jonsson himself. At the time, the young painter was only 24 years old. A few years earlier, his application to the Art Academy in Stockholm had been turned down! Considering that Jonsson went on to become the Audubon of the 20th century, I sure wonder why? Even in this early book, his genius is clearly visible...

My main problem with "Fåglar i naturen: Skog, park, trädgård" is that the birds featured in it are so, well, damn boring. These are the birds every Swede sees outside his window from childhood onwards: sparrows, finches, crows, magpies, thrushes... OK, magpies are quite cool (they are the parrots of the North!), but otherwise, I long to see some stray albatross or thunderbird gently circling around my local shopping mold, LOL.

Unfortunately, it seems that Jonsson's first book is unavailable at the present time from our favourite vendor, Amazon. Don't worry, the sparrows will be here next year as well...

Only for rich kids?

This is the sixth volume in the spectacular, 16-volume super-encyclopedia "Handbook of the Birds of the World" (HBW for short). This volume covers Mousebirds, Trogons and the Coraciiformes, a diverse order including (among others) Rollers, Kingfishers, Bee-eaters and Hornbills.

Each family is introduced by a large chapter with the following sub-headings: Systematics, Morphological Aspects, Habitat, General Habits, Voice, Food and Feeding, Breeding, Movements, Relationship with Man, Status and Conservation. Species presentations follow. All species and many subspecies described in the text are illustrated on large, full-page color plates. There are also a lot of photos, all in color, in the introductory chapters.

The text is not sufficiently popularized, and the HBW is therefore primarily intended for large libraries or scientific institutions. The price is also forbidding. Each volume costs about 260 dollars, presumably excluding postage and packing. Take that times 16, and you have the approximate price for the entire series. It's 4,160 dollars. See my point?

However, if you have a very serious interest in, say, hornbills or bee-eaters, investing in this volume might nevertheless be a good idea. All volumes are available from Lynx Edicions through their website.

Perching the bird

One of my staples at Amazon was to troll the bird-watchers with "reviews" of this kind, it always worked, 12 non-helpfuls and zero helpful votes for this one. 

The book "Kingfishers, bee-eaters and rollers" is very aptly titled. It actually is a book about kingfishers, bee-eaters and rollers, LOL. If you're interested in this rather obscure subject, this book is a must-have. If not, you may want to spend $97.98 on something else. Say, a book about waxwings, orioles and rooks.

Worth waiting for

"Birds of the Mediterranean and Alps" is the fifth and concluding volume of a series of field guides written and illustrated by Lars Jonsson, an accomplished Swedish painter and "amateur" ornithologist. His books are famous for their almost bizarrely brilliant colour illustrations. Somehow, Jonsson's birds look even better than the real thing! The two last volumes of the series are almost works of art in their own right. (I'm referring to this volume plus "Birds of Mountain Regions", which is volume four.)

"Birds of the Mediterranean and Alps" covers the birds of southern Europe, the Black Sea region and the mountain ranges of Central Europe. A few typical Anatolian and North African species are shown, as well. When I was a kid, me and my friends eagerly awaited the appearance of this volume, since we considered foreign birds to be more "cool" than the quintessentially boring ducks, crows and sparrows found in Sweden. We weren't disappointed. I mean, the bee-eater on the cover says it all!

The main problem with Jonsson's books have always been that the birds are split on five volumes in a rather idiosyncratic fashion. As field guides, they are probably overrated. Later, Jonsson finally published the one-volume "Birds of Europe" and entered the 21st century with flying (pun intended) colours.

However, I admit a strong nostalgia for the original, unwieldy concept. 

(For the record, the illustration above is *not* from Jonsson´s book.)