Tuesday Tome - Minnesota Birds Field Guide

Keeping the bird feeders filled is one of my weekly chores around the house. I keep three feeders stocked with safflower, one tube feeder with thistle, one tray feeder with a sunflower mix, and three hummingbird feeders. In addition to our feeders, Cheri keeps four large flower beds around our house that have a nice variety of seeds and blossoms that attract birds.

The main feeder station and a couple flower beds are right outside our dining room windows, so we often get to enjoy a close look at birds when we're sitting at the table. We also enjoy the wrens and cardinals near the garden when we're on the back patio by the garage. During our morning coffee time, we usually see gold finches and maybe a hummingbird or two while sitting in the Adirondack chairs on our front patio.

Our regular visitors include, Cardinals, House Finches, Sparrows, Gold Finches, Hummingbirds, Turtle Doves, Chickadees, Nuthatches, Redbellied and Downy Woodpeckers, Juncos, and Orioles. Occasionally, we'll have a bird at the feeders that we don't recognize. That's when we grab our Birds of Minnesota Field Guide to see if we can figure out what we've got.

This field guide by Stan Tekiela is perfect for amateurs like us. It only includes the most common birds of Minnesota (just over a hundred) and organizes them by color instead of name or species classification. So when we spot a bird we've never seen, we just note the bird's color, grab the field guide, go to the section for that color, and then flip through the pages of photos until we find a match. If, like us, you enjoy watching birds but you're a novice at identifying them, this little book is just what you need. It's great for kids too. Cheri and I have certainly had fun looking up birds with our grandkids. Sometimes, they just grab the book for the fun of looking at all the wonderful pictures.

Publisher's Book Description:

Learn about and identify birds using Stan Tekiela's state-by-state field guides. The full-page, color photos are incomparable and include insets of winter plumage, color morphs and more. Plus, with the easy-to-use format, you don't need to know a bird's name or classification in order to easily find it in the book. Using this field guide is a real pleasure. It's a great way for anyone to learn about the birds in your state.