Enjoy the thrill of discovery in this well-paced travel adventure that’s like going birding with a friend When journalist and field naturalist Nancy Grant packed her SUV with a basket of maps and field guides to head south to explore the Texas Gulf Coast she had a simple plan. Look for birds everywhere. And she found them—more than 150 species—singing, soaring, hunting for food, searching for mates, and raising youngsters. Grant’s easy-going conversational style, with plenty of quirky travel anecdotes, blends in-depth natural history insights with vivid on-the-scene reporting. Grant admits with charming directness her own struggles to memorize field marks and songs, and the satisfaction of getting it right. Birders of all experience levels will enjoy coming along for the ride. "I highly recommend Binge Birding: Twenty Days with Binoculars. Nancy Grant brings readers right along for a full immersion into the places she visited." --Podcast host Mardi Dickinson, BirdCallsRadio.com, episode BCR 176, first aired August 28, 2019. "Relatively early in my birding life I read two books that captured my imagination even more than all those wonderfully new birds in my field guide. The Feather Quest , by Pete Dunne, and Kenn Kaufman's classic Kingbird Highway introduced me to exotic birds and far-flung locations. More importantly, though, they instilled a desire in me to follow in their authors' footsteps, to travel to those places and see those birds. Nancy Grant's Binge Birding: Twenty Days with Binoculars has the potential to do the same." -- G. McCreary, The Birder's Library "Destined to become a standard on a birder's travel bookshelf, Nancy Grant's Binge Birding offers a fantastic opportunity for birders at home to experience her travels, and to be inspired to go on their own. Full of fascinating anecdotes and colorful descriptions, this book provides an impressive overview of southern and midwestern flora, fauna, and culture." -- Will Young, Bird Watcher's Digest , Jan/Feb 2021 Whatever path you've taken to reach your current level of interest and excitement about birds, I welcome you to the global community of birders.In the introduction to this book I describe how I got started looking at birds more carefully. It's been great fun so far, and there are always new birds to find, new things to learn, new people to meet. Wherever I am, I enjoy leading nature rambles to explore habitats and look for birds. Perhaps someday you and I will get to take a walk together. Until then, you can go out in the field with me in the pages of Binge Birding: Twenty Days with Binoculars. Let's go birding together!Nancy In April 2017 journalist Nancy Grant left home for a solo birding adventure during spring migration. "My travel plan is simple. Drive down to the Texas Gulf Coast and look at birds. Eat fresh seafood. Look at birds. Stay in nice hotels. Look at birds. Camp for a few nights. Look at birds. Maybe go horseback riding on the beach. Look at birds. Then drive back home. Look at birds everywhere. That's all there is to it." Some of it got more complicated than that.While driving almost four thousand miles alone through six states, Nancy explored parks, wildlife refuges, bayous, seashores, roadside ponds and puddles, even highway rest stops. She got lost, she got wet--and she found more than 150 species of birds.In this well-paced travel narrative you'll be directly on the scene with Nancy to enjoy the thrill of each discovery on boardwalks and beaches, in fields and forests, from sunrise to sunset. Along the way you'll see how birds use different habitats, how they find food and mates and raise their young. You'll meet fascinating people, too, and pick up fresh ideas for your own birdwatching fun. Field naturalist and author Nancy Grant is a freelance journalist who's been meeting deadlines as an independent writer since 1986. She is a member of the American Society of Journalists and Authors, with more than 350 magazine articles published in print and online. She is also a popular public speaker and media guest, and known on social media as The Friendly Birder. At birding festivals and out in the field, Nancy Grant enjoys meeting with people from all walks of life to share the delights of studying birds. She manages the fields, woods, and water resources on her old farm near Louisville, Kentucky as a nature preserve for the benefit of local wildlife.