Feather Trails: A Journey of Discovery Among Endangered Birds [damaged]

Brand new copy. Clean pages, tight binding. Minor damage - tear and creasing - to dust jacket.

The story of one woman's remarkable work with a trio of charismatic, endangered bird species—and her discoveries about the devastating threats that imperil them.

In Feather Trails, wildlife biologist and birder Sophie A. H. Osborn reveals how the harmful environmental choices we've made—including pesticide use, the introduction of invasive species, lead poisoning, and habitat destruction—have decimated Peregrine Falcons, Hawaiian Crows, and California Condors.

In the Rocky Mountains, the cloud forests of Hawai'i, and the Grand Canyon, Sophie and her colleagues work day-to-day to try to reintroduce these birds to the wild, even when it seems that the odds are steeply stacked against their survival.

With humor and suspense, Feather Trails introduces us to the fascinating behaviors and unique personalities of Sophie's avian charges and shows that what endangers them ultimately threatens all life on our planet.

More than a deeply researched environmental investigation, Feather Trails is also a personal journey and human story, in which Sophie overcomes her own obstacles—among them heat exhaustion, poachers, rattlesnakes, and chauvinism.

Ultimately, Feather Trails is an inspiring, poignant narrative about endangered birds and how our choices can help to ensure a future not only for the rarest species, but for us too.

"Few biologists have had Sophie Osborn's front-row seat to the challenges and triumphs of saving critically endangered birds. In Feather Trails, Osborn does more than take us deep inside her decades of work to bring Peregrine Falcons, Hawaiian Crows, and California Condors back from the brink. By immersing us in the lives of these birds, we see them as she sees them—unique individuals whose successes and tragedies become our own. I can't recommend it highly enough." —Scott Weidensaul, author of A World on the Wing

"I cannot put Feather Trails down. The book flies, and gracefully. It is timely, important, and applies widely. It reaches wide, and I hope it will be widely read. All Sophie says is true and can and should also be said." —Bernd Heinrich, biologist and professor emeritus, University of Vermont

"Through the adventures of a spirited field biologist, we are awakened to the plight of imperiled birds. This is a story of tenacity, the power of the Endangered Species Act, and ultimately of hope for bringing back birds from the brink of extinction." —Marina Richie, author of Halcyon Journey, 2024 recipient of the John Burroughs Medal for distinguished nature writing