Welcome to Subirdia

by John M. Marzluff

This book is about how bird populations change when forestland is converted into suburbs. Cities proper tend to have five ubiquitous bird species living in them, no matter where you are in the world: European starlings, Canada geese, house sparrows, rock pigeons and mallard ducks. But to the author's surprise, suburbs tend to have a much larger variety of bird species living in them than the original forest ever did. He conducted a lot of detailed studies to find out exactly which species were present where, how their territories shifted as developments were built, and what contributed to their success. The results show that a surprising number of birds can adapt to and tolerate living in man-made environments, others outright exploiting the human resources. Many more, with a little consideration from people, will do just fine.

You'd think I would really like this book. I found the premise of it really interesting, but for some reason it was dull reading. I couldn't pinpoint just why the writing style came across as stiff and dry to me, but after three times trying to get through a chapter and instead feeling bored, I gave up. It's going back to the library.

Abandoned               303 pages, 2014