Beautiful Books on England’s Garden Birds
The Hidden Life of Garden Birds is a beautifully illustrated book to over 50 of our garden birds, glimpsing into their everyday lives. From feeding behaviours to territorial conflict and breeding/nesting, learn how our familiar birds live each day.
Did you know that:
- Woodpeckers can learn simple codes?
- Hooded crows form connections with humans?
- A jay’s call affects a squirrel’s behaviour?
Dominic Couzens is an award-winning nature writer, with over 40 books published. He has regular columns in nature-writing magazines, and also is author of a book on how to save British endangered wildlife
Our Garden Birds is a delightful illustrated hardback gift book by pop artist (and ornithologist Matt Sewell), who pairs gorgeous art with descriptions of favourite garden birds.
From great tits ‘bossing the other birds around’ to the ‘playful yet shy buoyancy’ of bullfinches and the waxwing ‘like a computer-generated samurai finch’.
You’ll learn about common garden birds like tits, sparrows and finches, blackbirds and less common pied wagtails and redwings, along with migrating hoopoes.
From wood pigeons to ‘martins’ (house martins, swallows, swifts), tiny wrens to dunnocks, the crow family (including blue jays), robins, starlings and a few woodland birds (woodpeckers, owls and birds of prey), this is a wonderful and light-hearted read!
Save Our Birds is a wonderful read. Leaving no habitat unexplored around the British Isles, he provides a wealth of practical advice on how to help birds in cities, coastlands, woodlands and farms.
Imagine a garden entirely without birds. Imagine a whole street empty of them; a town with no spring nests or morning birdsong; no swifts or swallows overhead on hot days. Actually, don’t. It’s far too horrible.
Our once insect-rich summers are now a thing of the past, due to pesticides and intensive farming practices.
Matt is passionate about saving our birds, and his writing will make you passionate too:
Put simply, a lot of our birds are endangered, because the UK and Europe just isn’t wild enough anymore. All of our outdoor spaces are owned, managed and pumped full of chemicals to yield as much from the earth as possible.
Matt Sewell is an artist and ornithologist who has written several best-selling books on bird and other wildlife. His designs for birds even feature on stamps on Isle of Man.
- If you live with cats, keep them indoors at dusk and dawn, when garden birds are feeding.
- Don’t feed birds stale, mouldy or crusty bread (nor buttered bread, fat can smear on feathers, affecting weatherproofing and insulation).
- Never use brightly-coloured or tin bird houses (they overheat and attract predators).
- Read more on create safe havens for garden birds, and how to stop birds flying into windows
- Don’t play birdsong near birds, it can confuse and attract predators.
Britain’s Birds is a charming illustrated treasury of 70 of Britain’s beautiful birds. With natural history facts, folklore and literary appearances, the books is a fascinating guide and makes the perfect gift for birders. The book features 40 custom illustrations.
Did you know blackbirds may have originally been white? Or the number of times you hear a cuckoo (determines how many children you’ll have?)
Or woodpeckers have special shock absorbers built into their beaks? Or in 1958, a puffin was blown inland to Bromley, where he knocked a man off his bicycle?
We’ve given human names to familiar garden birds, (Tom Tit, Jenny Wren) because we see them as friends. St Francis of Assisi (the patron saint of animals) reputedly duetted with a nightingale.
While a blackbird was said to have nested in the outstretched hand of Irish hermit St Kevin of Glendalough. Gaining trust of birds was a manifestation of holiness.
Jo Woolf is Writer in Residence at the Royal Scottish Geographical Society. She lives by the sea, where she writes about landscape, wildlife and history.
The Book of Birds is a collaboration between artist Jackie Morris and writer Robert Macfarlane, who wrote the giant book The Lost Words on treasuring words from the natural world. This dazzling celebration of British birdlife makes a truly wonderful gift.
With quieter dawns and spring, this is designed to bring back our birds, we still have time to save our bird friends from becoming endangered or extinct. Find a compendium of 49 bird species (all of which are in danger) – from avocat (the symbol of the RSPB) to yellowhammer. From Dipper to Dunnock and Kestrel to Kingfisher. The book shows readers how to identify each bird, whether in the city, by the river, up a mountain or at the ocean..
You’ll learn about each bird’s habits and habitat, patterns of flight and song, how they hunt, nest and raise their young. And how we can help them thrive. Each page is mesmerising with art in watercolour and gold, to inspire. Explore the ‘seven wonders’ of birds: Nest, Egg, Beak, Song, Feather, Flight and Migration.
Seven years in the making, The Book of Birds is a love letter to the splendours and mysteries of birdlife, and a clarion call to halt the loss of birds from land, sea and sky.
From Dipper to Dunnock and Kestrel to Kingfisher, from mountain to ocean and city to river, Jackie Morris and Robert Macfarlane conjure the unique spirit and lifeway of each species. This is a book to be treasured by all.
Be a Birder is a treasure! The moment you open this book, you’ll fall in love with the 50 birds featured, each with gorgeous black-and-white illustrations and information on their habitat, behaviour and movements. And Hamza is a wonderful writer who will instil a love of birds, in anyone who reads this book.
Hamza Yassin was born in Sudan and on arrival to England as a child, only spoke four words of English (he began to learn the language by watching David Attenborough’s The Life of Birds).
This fuelled in him a passion that led to a degree in zoology with conservation, and career as a wildlife cameraman. He recently presented Hamza’s Hidden Wild Isles (wonderful viewing on BBC iPlayer).
Tips to Help Garden Birds
- Keep cats indoors at dusk and dawn, when birds are feeding.
- Don’t feed birds stale, mouldy or crusty bread (nor buttered bread, fat can smear on feathers, affecting weatherproofing and insulation).
- Never use coloured or tin bird houses (they overheat and attract predators).
- Read more on create safe havens for garden birds, and how to stop birds flying into windows.
- Don’t play birdsong near birds, it can confuse and attract predators.
Book Excerpt
I absolutely love birds. They make me tick. It’s no exaggeration to say that I wake up and go to sleep, thinking about birds. All of my conversations get redirected back to birds somehow.
When someone asks me what it is I love about birds, my first answer is that they can fly. I still find myself staring at their wings and thinking ‘How can you do that?’
Birds in Cities, Parks and Gardens
- Blackbird
- Goldcrest (and Firecrest)
- Magpie
- Peregrine Falcon
- Redwing
- Ring-Necked Parakeet
- Rock Dove (and Feral Pigeon)
- Starling
- Swift
Birds in the Woods
- Bullfinch
- Great Spotted Woodpecker
- Green Woodpecker
- Nightingale
- Nuthatch
- Sparrowhawk
- Tawny Owl
- Wryneck
Birds in Moors and Mountains
- Black Grouse
- Capercaillie
- Dartford Warbler
- Dotterel
- Golden Eagle
- Hen Harrier
- Merlin
- Wheatear
Birds on Farmland
- Barn Owl
- Lapwing
- Long-Tailed Tit
- Red Kite
- Skylark
- Waxwing
- Yellowhammer
Birds on Rivers, Marshes & Estuaries
- Curlew
- Dipper
- Great Crested Grebe
- Grey Heron
- Grey Wagtail
- Kingfisher
- Osprey
- Snipe
- Teal
Birds on the Coasts
- Arctic Tern
- Black-Browed Albatross
- Chough
- Eider
- Herring Gull
- Northern Gannet
- Puffin
- Stonechat
- White-Tailed Eagle
Where to Buy Good Birdwatching Binoculars
It’s important not to disturb birds (don’t play birdsong, it can confuse and attract predators), when watching them. RSPB Puffin Binoculars are around £30 (they are designed for children, but they are small and lightweight, so also good for adults who don’t want to lug around heavy binoculars).
They are easy to hold still, and offer a wide field of view and sharp image quality. They include a case and wrist strap, sold with a 1-year warranty.
