tor Emanuel, Alec Forbes-Watson,

Steve Hilty, Ben King, Roger Tory

Peterson, Olin Pettingill, Arnold

Small, Don Turner, and dozens of

others. Many other books, notably

Pettingill's and Heintzelman's bird-

finding guides, suffer from the lack

of this kind of collaboration.

The most obvious fault in the bdok

is the choice of English species names.

Everyone who studies birds on several

continents is aggravated by the illogic

and inconsistency of many of the com-

mon names, but Alden and Gooders'

response is excessive. For example,

regular Minnesota species include, in

their terminology, Goosander, North-

ern Treecreeper, Great Gray Shrike,

Long-tailed Duck, and Bald Sea-Eagle!

North American species do appear to

be the hardest hit, and one must sus-

pect the authors of flaunting their

cosmopolitanism. On the other hand,

why they still use "Everglade Kite"

is harder to understand. The most im-

portant value of a name is, after all,

that it be commonly recognized, and

substituting "American Dabchick" and

"Painted Whitestart" into the U.S. list

is hardly a step forward. (There is an

index that cross-references "local"

names.) Clements' choices in his Birds

of the World: a Checklist seem much

more reasonable.

A less blatant, but more serious

disappointment, is the minimum at-

tention given to environmental pro-

tection. For example, I gather that the

forests of Borneo and Thailand are

among the most desperately threat-

ened in the world, but one can read

the exciting chapters on Khao Yai and

Kinbalu in blissful ignorance of those

problems. Are birders going to go on

indulging themselves in their hobby,

oblivious to the destruction of the re-

maining wild areas? Developing a

world-wide interest without corres-

ponding environmental concern and

action would be pathetic, .and the au-

thors could have made an important

contribution in very little space.

These two weaknesses do not reduce

the value of the book. Alden and Good-

ers have done a wonderful job at what

would seem an almost impossible un-

dertaking. Any serious birder would

do well to read at least parts of it,

and no one doing any international

travel can afford to overlook it.

-Stephen Greenfield

PROCEEDINGS OF THE MINNESOTA

ORNITHOLOGICAL RECORDS COMMITTEE

Kim R. Eckert, M.O.R.C. Secretary

Following is a list of all records

voted on by M.O.R.C. from July

through December of 1981. As in the

article published in The Loon 53:129-

131, each listing includes the species,

date, location, vote total, the volume/

42

page reference, if any, where the de-

tails of the record were published,

and, for unacceptable records, a sum-

mary of the reasons why the record

was not accepted. It should be pointed

out that reasons for the votes on ac-

The Loon Vol. 54