Just browsing through some bookmarks & found this one saved for "later"
THE TOP 10: Books Every Birder Should HaveBut number 6 caught my eye...drier than the Sahara, I'm sure, but probably fascinating too...
6. Molt in North American Birds by Steve N.G. Howell
(2010 Houghton Mifflin)
Howell’s Molt book is a masterpiece. As arguably the most prolific bird book writer today, Howell dives headlong into a subject seldom tread upon, yet instrumental in birdlife. Molt is a subject that makes many birder’s eyes glaze over, and this book is not always easy reading, but it richly rewards the efforts by the reader to disentangle this interesting subject. Consider that molt is a taxing process, if you are a bird, requiring a lot of energy. This means that for most birds, molt will not overlap with breeding or migration, both of which also require heaps of energy. Most of us know when a bird breeds and when it migrates, and if you learn when and how it replaces its feathers you suddenly have a much more complete picture of a bird’s life. Learning the differences of molt strategies between species and subspecies is yet more illuminating, as these often speak to differences in breeding and migration strategies, allowing one to consider how taxa evolve. The family accounts of this information-rich book are replete with examples of how and why molt strategies evolve, allowing for conclusions to be drawn about “big picture” concepts in bird evolution.
