This introductory chapter recounts how E. B. White's essay titled “Mr. Forbush's Friends” opened a new bird world to the author. The essay introduced the author to Edward Howe Forbush, who is best known for writing Birds of Massachusetts and Other New England States, a three-volume set published in 1928. Within the pages of Forbush's work, the author found the expected information — breeding and feeding, size and color — and a bit of the unexpected in his reports on the “Economic Status” of each bird. In this section, he offers how the birds are perceived in the human economy, like the Black-crowned Night Heron, which “is accused of being injurious to the fishery interests.” Forbush was an inspiration for this collection of reports from the field, which expand with reflections on love, family, life, and death and engage a range of emotions from wonder to humor. And because birds magnify our relationship to the natural world, this collection include stories about habitat loss, declining species, birds that collide with buildings, or birds now extinct.
