Birds of Paradise

"You’ll initially find it hard to believe that these pictures are real—but they are. These are the most beautiful photographs of the world’s most beautiful birds. The birds’ behavior, richly described in the text, is as remarkable as their appearance. This is a book like no other book."
--Jared Diamond, ornithologist and author of Guns, Germs, and Steel

Eight years. Eighteen expeditions. Fifty-one field sites. Thirty-nine unique species of birds-of-paradise, all photographed in the wild for the first time in history.

“We turned our passion for science, photography, and media documentation into a comprehensive vision to share an unparalleled treasure of Earth’s biodiversity with the world,” write biologists and explorers Tim Laman and Edwin Scholes.

These treasures are the spectacular birds-of-paradise, native only to the remote New Guinea region but known the world around for their brilliant colors, otherworldly plumes, and elaborate courtship dances. Now, for the first and perhaps only time, all 39 species of these extraordinary birds are showcased together through the revealing words and exclusive photographs in this landmark book.

TIM LAMAN is a field biologist and wildlife photojournalist affiliated with the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University. A fellow of the International League of Conservation Photographers, he has photographed 20 articles for National Geographic magazine.

EDWIN SCHOLES, an ornithologist and biodiversity video curator at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, has studied the birds of paradise for more than a decade and is a leading authority on their behavior and evolution.