Learning the Birds

This chapter focuses on the author's experiences of birding in Woodstock and the Hudson River. It discusses Alexander Wilson, the author of a nine-volume work, American Ornithology, and considered by many to be the father of American ornithology. In his American Ornithology, Wilson writes of the Red-headed Woodpecker. Red-headed Woodpecker populations have gone up and down over the decades, at one point nearing extinction. Since the mid-sixties, according to the North American Breeding Bird Survey, populations have decreased by 70 percent. After seeing the Red-headed Woodpecker in Woodstock, the author was invited to go birding on the Hudson where she saw Red-winged Blackbirds.