Table of Contents
Preface to the Yale Edition ix
Introduction 1
1 Food Worth Defending 7
Sugar Fuels Noise 8
Successful Trees 13
Climate Survivors 13
Ancient Pollination 19
Where the Big Birds Are 21
Accessible Nectar 23
2 Forests that Exude Energy 32
Special Foods 35
The Forest Dominators 44
The Ultimate Aggressor 49
The Dawn of Group Defence 54
3 The First Song 58
Northern Orthodoxy 58
Forward Thinking 61
Early Musicians 73
The Australian Way 79
4 New Guinea: Australia's Northern Province 88
Rainforest Finds a New Home 94
What the Birds Reveal 96
Placing New Guinea 100
Australian Birds Shown in New Ways 103
5 Land of Parrots 106
Aptitude with Attitude 110
Parrots as Problems 113
Parrots as Pets 118
Trees that Store Seed 121
Southern Origins 127
6 The Last of the Forest Giants 133
Birds that Kick 133
Gigantism 141
Ecosystem Services 147
Conserving Difficult Birds 150
7 Australia as a Centre of Origin 152
Biogeography as Embarrassing Science 154
Waterrowl and Landfowl 156
Dodos and Hummingbirds 161
South or North? 164
Australia's Sister Lands 170
Australia as a Centre 176
8 The Forest Makers 181
Asian Immigrants 183
Almost Perfect Dispersal 185
More Fruit Couriers 194
Seed Highways 197
Unwelcome Forest Making 203
9 Of Grass and Fire 206
Grass-assisted Invasion 208
The Volatility of Savanna 213
Fire 215
When Grass is Eaten 224
Grasses as Shrubs 226
Uncertainties Rule 228
Fiery Future 230
10 Life in a Liquid Landscape 232
Sleeping on Air 233
Made to Formula 236
The Great South Wind 238
The New Zealand Factor 241
Ending Isolation 244
Adaptability and Vulnerability 247
Seabirds' Services 249
Seabirds in Trees 251
11 A Continent Compared 254
Living with Aggression 257
Nectar Niches 259
Absence as Opportunity 265
Recent Arrivals 270
Birds that Remain Surprising 272
Birds Around the World 276
12 People and Birds 281
Mutronbirds 283
Early Exploitation 288
Taking by Europeans 288
Gondwanan Pets 293
Protecting Assets 295
Study as Taking 297
Conservation and the Lyrebird 301
Modern Relationships 304
The Ecology of Feeding 309
Birds Into the Future 313
Notes 319
Bibliography 362
Acknowledgements 378
Photo Credits 379
Index 380