Birding From a Tractor Seat

by Charles T. Flugum

B & W Drawiing Illustrations By Walter J. Breckenridge, Birding In Iowa And Minnesota Over A Lifetime On The Farm, Sm Quarto, Dust Jacket, Hardcover

Genres: Agriculture, Nature

442 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1975

Reviews

[Harron68 · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked it up out of curiosity, I'm not a birder. I was completely taken by the author's essays. They were printed in the '50s and '60s in a Minnesota newspaper.
He brings readers alongside as he shares his love for birds and nature. How times have changed from those days. Respect for Nature, working with the land instead of maximizing production was part of his respect for the bounty that land offers.
The trips he took to Duluth and other sites gave me a chuckle. Weather and the variability of migrations made for sometimes funny, sometimes disappointing adventures.
The book I have was an early hardcover edition with excellent heavyweight paper, further enhanced with Flugum's autograph. I treasure this collection from one who understood and appreciated our precious earth. May his insights cause us to continue to the battle for saving wild and not-quite-wild places before they fall to our endless hunger for profit. The earth belongs to more than humans, it is home to birds and everything from plants to fishes.

[Ann Fisher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Birding on a farm in Albert Lea, Minnesota, during the fifties and sixties, with the occasional look back to the author's childhood and occasional excursions as far as Duluth.

[Lauriann · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked up this gem at an antiquarian book barn. It reminded me of my father who spent many hours on a tractor and with whom I shared a love of birds. He kept a life list of every bird he saw at the farm in his decades there. (Regretfully, upon his death the book was never found. Did he leave it on a tree stump? an old stone wall?) This book goes beyond bird identification and discusses flight patterns, nesting behavior, migration habits and more. His descriptions add further interest to the birds I easily recognize, giving me new things to marvel over. This book is on my nightstand where I grant myself one bird chapter per night. There are over one hundred birds included....... many sweet dreams!