Читать книгу Birds of the Sierra Nevada - Ted Beedy - Страница 11

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

In a region as vast and dynamic as the Sierra Nevada, no one could ever acquire or maintain detailed, up-to-date knowledge of the status, distribution, and natural history of every bird. To make this book as current and accurate as possible, we relied heavily on the experience and boundless generosity of the following local and regional experts and avid Sierra birders: Dan Airola, Elizabeth Ammon, Bob Barnes, Matt Brady, Ryan Burnett, Walt Carnahan, Mark Chichester, Rudy Darling, Katy Delaney, David DeSante, Bruce Deuel, Colin Dillingham, Jon Dunn, Todd Easterla, Mary Jo Elpers, Jim Estep, Tom Hahn, Aaron Haiman, Rob Hansen, Matt Heindel, Tom and Jo Heindel, Josh Hull, Rodd Kelsey, Barney Kroeger, Jack Laws, Kelli Levinson, John Lockhart, Jim Lomax, Tim Manolis, Guy McCaskie, Chris McCreedy, Mac McCormick, Joe Medley, Bob Meese, Martin Meyers, Bartshé Miller, Joe Morlan, Kristie Nelson, Will Richardson, Deren Ross, Susan Sanders, Dave Shuford, Rich Stallcup, Susan Steele, John Sterling, Brad Stovall, Jerry Tecklin, Phil Unitt, Bruce Webb, Bud and Margaret Widdowson, John Wilson, and Bill Yeates. We also thank all those who participated in any of the 44 Breeding Bird Surveys or 25 Christmas Bird Counts we used to detect and validate population trends of Sierra birds. Any mistakes that remain are entirely the responsibility of the authors.

We are indebted to Peter Pyle, Steve Howell, David Sibley, and David DeSante for their careful reviews of Keith Hansen’s art. We thank Steve Beckwitt for preparing the maps, which deftly balance clarity and detail. Elliot Minner performed the digital magic needed to put the paintings into the format needed for this book. Katrina Beedy spent many hours helping us to prepare the index. Tim Messick’s botanical expertise was essential for defining the various ecological zones and bird habitats of the Sierra.

Steve Granholm, coauthor of Discovering Sierra Birds, offered his generous and enthusiastic support for using ideas and text from that original book. We thank Shirley Beedy, Bill and Lorraine Dicke, Burr Heneman, and Janet Visick for reviewing portions of the manuscript and improving the quality of our prose.

Dan Airola, Bob Barnes, Chris Conard, Kathleen Lynch, Martin Meyers, Kristie Nelson, Dave Quady, Phil Robertson, Susan Sanders, Rich Stallcup, and John Sterling spent many hours patiently reviewing earlier versions of the manuscript and making suggestions, which improved our book immeasurably. We also benefited from thoughtful peer reviews by David DeSante, John Marzluff, Will Richardson, and David Shuford.

Barbara Moulton expertly guided us through the process of finding the best publisher for this book, and Phyllis Faber and Karl Olson offered excellent guidance about publication. We are deeply grateful to Blake Edgar, Kate Hoffman, Lynn Meinhardt, and Chuck Crumly of the University of California Press and to David Peattie at BookMatters and Amy Smith Bell for their help, patience, and steady support throughout.

We are indebted to the David and Lucile Packard Foundation for its generous grant in support of Keith’s artwork, and to Cole Wilbur and Mark Valentine for their help and guidance in securing this grant. We also appreciate the efforts of the Yosemite Association, and later the Yosemite Conservancy, for managing these funds. Thanks to Keith’s friends at the Bolinas Museum who nourished him with support, on many levels, for more than 20 years. Generous grants from Sierra Foothills Audubon Society and Sacramento Audubon Society were also much appreciated.

Finally, we acknowledge the essential and loving support of our wives, Susan Sanders, Kathleen Lynch, and Patricia Briceño, who tolerated the many hours we spent hunched in front of computers, or over drawing boards, and understood our need to take all those trips into the Sierra to conduct our required “research.”