~How to Read Aloud
~Science Home Page   

*If you can only buy one book, this is the one you need!
Handbook of Nature Study by Anna Botsford Comstock
   First written in 1911, this book was intended to "teach" teachers how to teach their students the art of nature-study.  It is a comprehensive volume, containing the most common species of everything from insects to shells, ferns to rocks, and so on.

 This book has never failed to answer our "nature" questions.  For example, one day Chloe and I noticed that our parsley plants were completely devoid of leaves and that peculiarly striped caterpillars covered the stems.  We quickly got out our handbooks and easily found  out  what our culprit was-- and in the black and white illustration, we could see that even Mrs. Comstock's striped caterpillar was sitting on a parsley plant! 

   Another reason I love this book is that interspersed throughout the nature pictures and observations are bits of poetry and prose, illuminating the subject of study.

                                                       $24.95    pb    886pp    

*This comprehensive guide is also easier to use than most others!  
All the Birds of North America
   When I first got interested in learning about birds, I began to notice medium-large charcoal brown birds with matching brown straight-bill beaks everywhere I went.  I decided to go to the bookstore and look at a bird guide to find out what they were.  Guide after guide proved useless until I came to this one.  (Just to prove my ignorance, the bird I was looking for was actually one of the most common birds around- the starling!)  So, why couldn't I find this bird in the other books?  Because they only showed a picture of the bird in its familiar speckled black adult plumage (with bright yellow beak), while the birds I was looking at were still in their brown juvenile plumage (with brown beak). 

   Besides having a flexible waterproof cover and a unique and very easy system for locating birds, this book provides all the info you need on one page, including fabulous drawings of bird species at different stages of their lives and easy to read-at-a-glance maps to see if this species is present in your area. 

   Another advantage of this book is that the birds are presented  at an angle that aids identification.  For example, another guide may have a beautiful photograph of a red-tailed hawk sitting on a tree limb.  However, since it is much more likely that you'll spot this bird as it is flying over-head, this guide also presents the bird in flight so that you can see the unique underside characteristics.

$19.95   flexible waterproof cover

The Burgess Bird Book for Children
You don't have to keep your eye on ebay any longer!  This outstanding book is back in print once more.  Written by Thornton Burgess, one of my all-time favorite authors, this book brings to life the unique characteristics of many bird species by having them interact with other birds and animals.  (We have a special "Jenny Wren" outside who makes quite a racket at us!) 

$7.95  paperback, unabridged from 1919 edition, 32 original illustrations reproduced in black & white.

Birds, Nature's Magnificent Flying Machines
This is the absolute best book about how birds fly and correlates wonderfully with Anna Comstock's handbook questions on wing structure.   Feathers, body structure, and wings of different types of birds are covered along with the mechanics of bird flight.  The illustrations are beautiful! 

$6.95

100 Birds and How They Got Their Names
A fun way to learn about birds is to find out how they got their names.  Discover the myths, legends, literature, and history associated with our avian friends. 

Use Burgess for elementary and this book for middle and upper grades!

$17.05 (10% off list)

There's an Owl in the Shower
   Because protecting spotted owls has cost Borden's father his job as a logger in the old growth forest of northern California, Borden intends to kill any spotted owl he sees, until he and his father find themselves taking care of a young owlet. A good supplemental reader for upper elementary and middle school ages.

$5.99
 

North American Wildlife
Do you remember those large natural history books of our childhood (60s & 70s)?  I especially loved one put out by Golden Book which I pored over on many afternoons.  I guess I like North American Wildlife because it resembles those old colorful books.  The drawings are wonderful and show everything you need to see in order to make an identification.  It covers mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians, fish, invertebrates, trees and shrubs, wildflowers, non-flowering plants, and mushrooms, in addition to covering thirty different habitats such as Pacific Coast forest, abandoned field, Cypress swamp, tidal marsh, and Arctic tundra.  While many nature guides have dry descriptions of their entries, the descriptions in this book are pleasures to read. 

North American Wildlife is not the exhaustive guide to birds which you will need for your bird study.  (You'll need All the Birds of North America for that.)  However, it does contain a lot of useful information about birds and interesting tidbits of info about many different species.  We keep a copy in our car (along with All the Birds of NA) at all times.  Whenever we see an interesting wildflower on the side of the highway we "whip" out the book  and haven't been disappointed yet!

$26.95 (This price is 10% off retail because we think you need it.  We suggest it for almost every area of nature study.)

Playing Cards
Each pack contains 54 playing cards, each with a color picture of
a different bird.  An easy way to learn the birds names!

Choose from:
Birds of the World & Birds of Prey of the World  

$5.00

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