Nests, Eggs, and Skeletons
Nests, eggs, and skeletons are part of what birds often leave behind, letting you know they have been where you are. The nests are fascinating constructions, and are a part of ornithological study. Bird eggs come in all shapes and sizes and colors and have been the subject matter of many books in their entirety. Lastly, bird skeletons - often delicate, rather prehistoric looking - are amazing to look at. They too have been the subject of entire volumes, and the Lloyd is fortunate to hold the work of Thomas Eyton, still one of the premier authors on aviary skeletal construction.
Click on the bird image thumbnails to view a larger image.
T. C. Eyton. Osteologia avium, or, A Sketch of the Osteology of Birds. Wellington, Salop, England: R. Hobson, 1867. Vol. 2, plates.
Click on the image to view several of Eyton's skeleton sketches.
Thomas Campbell Eyton (1809-1180) was an English naturalist who studied at Cambridge with his friend Charles Darwin. In 1855, Eyton built a large natural history museum at his family estate, Eyton Hall, in Shropshire, but the collection has long since disappeared.
Thomas G. Gentry. Nests and Eggs of Birds of the United States. Philadelphia: J. A. Wagenseller, 1882.
Click on the bird image to view several images from Gentry.
This was the sixth book by Thomas Gentry (1845-1905), an ornithologist from Germantown, Pennsylvania. Gentry was a member of several respected professional organizations such as the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia and the Nuttall Ornithological Club, and was a frequent contributor to several scientific journals during the 1870s and 1880s.
A poor review of Nests and Eggs of Birds of the United States appearing in the Bulletin of the Nuttall Ornithological Club, vol. 7, no. 4 (October 1882) put an end to Gentry's declining career. The reviewer said the book was "well-adapted for the amusement of children" and insinuated that parts of the book were plagiarized. Gentry never wrote another scientific book about birds and instead turned to topics such as bird poetry and genealogy. He also began to explore philosophy and transcendentalism and published the works Life and Immortality, or, Soul in Plants and Animals (1897) and Intelligence in Plants and Animals (1900).
Arthur G. Butler. Birds' Eggs of the British Isles. London: L. Upcott Gill; New York: C. Scribner's Sons, 1904.
Click on Butler's photograph to view several images from the book, which was illustrated by Frederick William Frohawk (see Illustrators).