BIRDS OF PREY OF NORTHEASTERN NORTH AMERICA. By Leon Augustus Hausman. Illustrated in pen and ink by Jacob Bates Abbot. Frontispiece by George Miksch Sutton.

1948 1st edition. 4to (182 x 260mm). Ppxxviii,164. Colour frontispiece, full-page monochrome illustrations. Cloth-backed boards, spine titled in gilt.

A defence of the birds of prey written at a time when so many saw them as vermin". Mr. Hausman writes of three general classifications of birds of prey of Northeastern North America - American vultures, American hawks and their kin, and owls. In setting straight the record of these birds' performance, he clears up also some misconceptions about their abilities. ...The thirty drawings of birds by Jacob Bates Abbott and the accompanying descriptions give weight to Mr. Hausman's statement that 'In their rightful habitat the birds of prey, so estimable an element of beauty and natural interest, and so valuable a factor in the biological balance, should be molested no more than any other natural group.'"