#45 [2022/CBR14] The Bird Way by Jennifer Ackerman

An old college friend recommended The Bird Way (2020) by Jennifer Ackerman to me when I told him I'd gotten interested in bird watching. Paying attention to birds opened up a new world to me. I suddenly realized there were entire ecosystems busily living their lives all around me, but they were too far away to see clearly and moved too fast for me to follow. Now that I've learned a little about birds and can sometimes recognize them, it's so exciting to see what they're up to. There are apex predators (red-tailed hawks) wreaking havoc all over the place! And there are so many birds just in my backyard that are incredibly fascinating!

So, it's probably not surprising that I really enjoyed The Bird Way. I already knew that birds were amazing and incredibly diverse, but Ackerman really brings this point home. She points out that a lot of early research on birds was flawed because it was done by men in North America and Europe. They naturally focused on male birds that lived where they lived and extrapolated from there. But North America and Europe often have migratory birds with short breeding seasons, which makes for less interesting birds. If you really want to see what birds are up to, Australia is one of the best places to go. 

The book is separated into five sections: talk, work, play, love, and parent. Ackerman focuses on the most interesting outliers of birds in these categories, which highlights how different, talented, and smart birds can be. Fortunately, I was already familiar with some of the birds Ackerman discusses, but I tried to google all the others so I could have a clear visual when she was describing them.

I loved this book. I found it fascinating, informative, and easy to read. I also felt like it had a bit of a feminist bent to it. Is it possible to put, "nevertheless she persisted"  in your book by accident? Also, who knew that mallard hens have genetically conspired a way to deter drake mallards from fathering their progeny when they're not wanted. When I discovered there was a whole world of birds around me, it opened up a whole new layer to my environment. Ackerman has opened up yet another layer with this book. 

Below are some of my favorite facts of the birds in Ackerman's book.

The superb lyrebird has an incredible gift for mimicking sound, and has been recorded sounding like a chainsaw. (It's on Youtube, but most of the time these birds mimic other birds and sounds in their environment.)

Australian Magpies are super smart and about 1/3 of the males can be super aggressive when defending their nests.

Kea's are incredibly smart and curious, and it would be delightful to visit a research station with them in Australia.

Eclectus parrots have a striking difference in color between the sexes. The mothers will sometimes kill their male sons. Scientists think this might be because females are born slightly earlier and thus are more likely to survive.

The brush turkey in Australia moves literal tons of dirt and plant material into a giant, decaying mound and buries the eggs inside so they will stay the perfect temperature. The babies have to dig their way out and the adult turkey kicks them away once they reach the surface.

And then there's the mallard duck. Mallards were one of the few birds I could recognize before I got into birding and one of the few birds I often see around here. It turns out that mallard males (drakes) can be giant assholes. They go after females, singly and in groups to force copulation--sometimes so violently that the hen dies. Now, here's the crazy part. Mallard drakes have a corkscrew-shaped penis [seriously, I had to look it up and it's crazy], but mallard hens have developed corkscrew shaped genitalia that goes the opposite direction--making it more difficult for male drakes to inseminate them if they are fighting them. I never knew such crazy drama was happening right under my nose, and I feel bad for those poor mallard hens constantly being bullied and attacked.