Crowdfunding for a curlew

KeskusteluBirds, Birding & Books

Liity LibraryThingin jäseneksi, niin voit kirjoittaa viestin.

Crowdfunding for a curlew

Tämä viestiketju on "uinuva" —viimeisin viesti on vanhempi kuin 90 päivää. Ryhmä "virkoaa", kun lähetät vastauksen.

1affle
syyskuu 29, 2015, 9:33 am

I like the books that this small, independent publisher produces, so I've signed up for this rather appealing project:

http://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/orison-for-a-curlew/

Some of the publisher's list is noted in this Publisher Series; I have a dozen and a half:

http://www.librarything.com/publisherseries/Little+Toller

2chrisharpe
lokakuu 7, 2015, 2:56 am

Wow, SbC has not been seen since 2001, so this is quite a challenge! Are you going? Loved Oliver Rackham's The Ash Tree.

3affle
lokakuu 7, 2015, 4:29 am

>2 chrisharpe:

Sadly no, no trip to Iran for me - at least not curlew-hunting - just a hand-bound book when it comes. The crowdfunding raised its initial target very quickly. Agreed about the Rackham book, it's a very good reason why this little publisher deserves to thrive.

4chrisharpe
tammikuu 4, 2016, 4:25 am

The book is out: http://www.spectator.co.uk/2016/01/is-the-slender-billed-curlew-already-extinct/ . Was it in your Christmas stocking affle?

5chrisharpe
tammikuu 4, 2016, 4:33 am

I see another review in the The Guardian, but curiously the photograph captioned "Slender-billed Curlew" is a Whimbrel.

6elenchus
tammikuu 4, 2016, 9:36 am

Just found this thread today. The book looks impressive, hoping affle will be able to post a commentary soon!

7affle
tammikuu 4, 2016, 12:04 pm

>4 chrisharpe:,>5 chrisharpe: Thanks for the links, Chris; there was a much more lukewarm review in the Times - no link, paywall. I don't suppose the Guardian's photolibrary runs to many pictures of a Slender-billed Curlew, and I didn't doubt your identification of what they did have as a Whimbrel, but as I wasn't sure just how like a Whimbrel the SbC is/was, I looked at the pictures in my BWP, which certainly shows the SbC as a much paler bird, like Beatrice Forshall's illustration used by the Speccy.

The book did arrive in time for Christmas, but as I haven't read it yet (>6 elenchus: I will comment when I have), the best bit has been the signed print I subscribed for, which has framed up very nicely. It's of a curlew, speaking in family not specific terms, in shades of grey like the book illustrations - the coloured picture referred to above doesn't appear in or on the book, which is a bit odd. The book is a decent enough production, with some golden curlews stamped into the cloth binding, but not very special: the standard £12 version would be the one to have, I imagine.

8chrisharpe
tammikuu 5, 2016, 1:36 am

Thanks for the information affle. I would be interested to hear what you think of the book. Even as curlews go SbC is (was?) a very elegant bird, aptly-named and with neat black spots on the underparts and, sure enough, there are not too many photos - no excuse for incorrect labelling if they did not use one though. Let's hope our own Eurasian Curlew does not go the same way - its conservation status has deteriorated markedly and it is now reckoned to be the UK's most threatened bird species and doing only slightly better in the rest of Europe.