"John James Audubon's Birds of America is a portal into the natural world. Printed between 1827 and 1838, it contains 435 life-sized watercolours of North American birds, all reproduced from hand-engraved plates, and is considered to be the archetype of wildlife illustration. Nearly 200 years later, the Audubon prints are coming to life once again, thanks to our vibrant digital library. Roam around below and enjoy one of the most treasured pieces of Audubon's grand and wild legacy. Each print is also available as a free high-resolution download."
"The National Audubon Society would like to thank Richard Buonanno for compiling the content for this online version of John James Audubon's Birds of America. It is from an 1840 "First Octavo Edition" of Audubon's complete seven volume text, and presents Audubon's images and original text descriptions. Bird species can be found listed alphabetically, or categorized by family. Audubon's drawings of some species' anatomical features are also included in the Figures section. The list of species that have gone extinct since Audubon's time was provided by Mr. Buonanno, as was the list of State Birds." It is amazing to have the 435 watercolors available online, but even more so to read Audubon's narrative of each species --- the specimen, description, naming-- including the extinct ones. After a lifetime of work, the largest contribution to American ornithology, and the discovery and collection of many new species, today "Audubon" is part of the common name of only Audubon's Shearwater and Audubon's Oriole. The Audubon Warbler, which I think he named himself, became the western subspecies of Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle being the eastern.) One could spend many hours here. Thank you John James Audubon and thank you National Audubon Society. This is a national treasure. http://www.audubon.org/birds-of-america ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
