{"id":31544,"date":"2025-03-05T17:51:25","date_gmt":"2025-03-05T21:51:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/?p=31544"},"modified":"2025-03-05T17:51:25","modified_gmt":"2025-03-05T21:51:25","slug":"book-review-the-mindful-birders-journal-by-keith-paluso-iii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/2025\/03\/05\/book-review-the-mindful-birders-journal-by-keith-paluso-iii\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: The Mindful Birder&#8217;s Journal, by Keith Paluso III"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>The Mindful Birder&#8217;s Journal: Record Your Observations of the Winged World<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>by Keith Paluso III<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Publisher: Quarto Publishing Group, USA Inc.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>160 page hardcover.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Release date: April 2, 2024<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>This slender little volume is extremely portable. It will fit easily into a purse or backpack, right next to any, um, <em>other <\/em>stashes you might have tucked away in there&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s a good thing, too, because you&#8217;ll want this book with you whenever you go birding. Very user friendly and accessible to those just starting out, it&#8217;s chock full of hints and guidelines. The &#8220;How to Use This Journal&#8221; section begins with &#8220;The Ten Minute Rule&#8221;, which will help you take your time and get your head right for observation and birding. &#8220;What You&#8217;ll Need&#8221; has helpful hints on tools and items and mindsets. &#8220;Birding Guidelines&#8221; has just that. The main body of the book is divided seasonally, with twenty four species listed. My favorite was the Chimney Swifts from the Spring section. I never knew that they could not perch, instead using claws and spiky tail feathers in order to cling to vertical walls like caves and (natch) chimneys. There&#8217;s a Resources for Further Study part, with free birding app, pages to &#8220;Sketch What You See&#8221;, a\u00a0 place for mindful field notes and a two page &#8220;Life List&#8221; for species, locations and dates.<\/p>\n<p><strong>My verdict: 5 broomsticks.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>About the Author<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Keith Paluso III\u00a0<\/strong>is a musician, naturalist and content creator from Memphis, Tennessee. He has an environmental biology degree from the University of Tennessee. He began birding during a career as a state park ranger. His social media platforms are on TikTok and Instagram @thisiskeithpaluso. He lives in Tennessee with his wife and family (which includes fur kids).<\/p>\n<p><strong>About the Reviewer<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Weyland Smith is an eclectic solitaire wytch from New Jersey. He is a columnist and storyteller for Pagan Pages. Wey can be reached at weylandsmith@yahoo.com<\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-31539\" src=\"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/IMG_0055-212x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"212\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/IMG_0055-212x300.jpg 212w, https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/IMG_0055-150x211.jpg 150w, https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/IMG_0055.jpg 706w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 212px) 100vw, 212px\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Mindful Birder&#8217;s Journal: Record Your Observations of the Winged World by Keith Paluso III Publisher: Quarto Publishing Group, USA Inc. 160 page hardcover. Release date: April 2, 2024 This slender little volume is extremely portable. It will fit easily into a purse or backpack, right next to any, um, other stashes you might have tucked away in there&#8230; That&#8217;s a good thing, too, because you&#8217;ll want this book with you whenever you go birding. Very user friendly and accessible to those just starting out, it&#8217;s chock full of hints and guidelines. The &#8220;How to Use This Journal&#8221; section begins with &#8220;The Ten Minute Rule&#8221;, which will help you take your time and get your head right for observation and birding. &#8220;What You&#8217;ll Need&#8221; has helpful hints on tools and items and mindsets. &#8220;Birding Guidelines&#8221; has just that. The main body of the book is divided seasonally, with twenty four species listed. My favorite was the Chimney Swifts from the Spring section. I never knew that they could not perch, instead using claws and spiky tail feathers in order to cling to vertical walls like caves and (natch) chimneys. There&#8217;s a Resources for Further Study part, with free birding app, pages to &#8220;Sketch What You See&#8221;, a\u00a0 place for mindful field notes and a two page &#8220;Life List&#8221; for species, locations and dates. My verdict: 5 broomsticks. About the Author Keith Paluso III\u00a0is a musician, naturalist and content creator from Memphis, Tennessee. He has an environmental biology degree from the University of Tennessee. He began birding during a career as a state park ranger. His social media platforms are on TikTok and Instagram @thisiskeithpaluso. He lives in Tennessee with his wife and family (which includes fur kids). About the Reviewer Weyland Smith is an eclectic solitaire wytch from New Jersey. He is a columnist and storyteller for Pagan Pages. Wey can be reached at weylandsmith@yahoo.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":284,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10005],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31544","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/284"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31544"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31544\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31555,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31544\/revisions\/31555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}