The songs in the air are about to change their feathers. Instead of just crows and chickadees, soon there will be all the birds of spring ganging up in their ornithological orchestra.
Helping conduct the symphony of the season is Clive Keen, with his latest book inspired by bird-watching.
Whether you're ornery for ornithology or just mildly curious about feathered friends, spring in any winter city is always a changing of the bird guard.
Windows all across Prince George have binoculars nearby, and the walks in the woods often involve fresh notebooks and fully charged cameras. It's a fascination that touches all age brackets and any background.
Keen has just released the latest edition of Birdwatching: A Different Sort of Guide. It's a collection of his clever musings and spectacular photos, all arising from his constant habit of tracking down the interesting animal aviators of this area.
Some spring from his international travels in search of rare bird sightings.
"It almost always happens that I come back from a birder's trip and I have a notion or two for scribbling out a column," he said. "I started writing for B.C. Nature; that just started off as a set of funny articles. Then B.C. Birding Magazine wanted some stuff, so I write a funny one, I write a serious one, I balance that off. Often it's written almost entirely in the car on the way home from the outing. The words are all there in my head and just tumble out when I get home."
He has collected these columns into this latest book. He has done past versions, but when a bundle of new columns gets to a certain size, he adds them to the next edition.
"This one is considerably longer," Keen said. "If you know (poet Walt) Whitman's book Leaves of Grass, he just kept adding to it." The first edition was 12 poems, the last edition was more than 400. "I figured I'd do what he did. I write about 12 articles a year, so it keeps making for new growth. I've got 82 articles now. Every time I think I'm all written out, I come to another one."
If he has a favourite, it would probably be found on Page XV of the book's preamble. It's his "bluffer's guide" or the comedic list of terms he suggests neophyte birders use to sound more educated in ornithology than they actually are.
Under the thick pudding of English wit that coats the book (Keen, a retired vice-president at UNBC, was gifted to Canada from England) is the meat of bird watching. Keen is a man of mirth but he is legitimately steeped in the recreation of bird watching, especially since he passed the age of sensibility for his other favourite local pastime: cave exploration.
"I went out a few times and got to the mouth of the cave and thought, nawww, that's going to hurt if I go in there," he said with a resigned laugh. "Birdings not a bad thing when your bones are creaking. And it's as physical as you want it to be."
The writing of the book actually enhances his own level of birding enjoyment.
"It's entertaining; it's largely that," he said for why he keeps up with columns. "The best way to learn something, of course, is to teach it. That's what it is. I'm an old philosopher so that's the motivation."
The book is published by Traybon Books, which is just one more joke Keen gets to wink at we readers. "It's me and a bunch of caving mates," he said. "It was for things we produced for caving, and one the first things we did was craft a tray used for clearing debris, and it was hard to produce but it worked well. It was good. A good tray. Tres bon. Tray bon."
The latest edition of Birdwatching: A Different Sort of Guide is available at Books & Company and other participating book vendors. It retails for approximately $25.
