Niall Rankin
In this book the author has taken the unusual course of selecting three birds from two orders, the Podicipitiforms and Colymbiformes or diving-birds, and following them to their various breeding places in Britain.,He draws an interesting comparison between the lives of three individual pairs which, though of similar build and habit, have chosen widely separated areas for their breeding and have totally different neighbours in consequence.,He takes us to a lake in Kent to give an intimate description of the home-life of the Great Crested Grebe, illustrated with probably the finest series of photographs of the "feather-feeding" ever taken, then to the home of the Black-throated Diver in the wildest parts of the Scottish Highlands, and lastly to the northernmost limits of our islands where the Red-throated Diver has its stronghold in the Shetlands.,Colonel Rankin, who owns the famous bird and Grey Seal sanctuary on the Isles of Treshnish in the Hebrides, has an intimate knowledge of the Highlands and islands of Scotland and a very wide experience of bird-photography. In this book he has combined the two to give us a graphic picture of two of Scotland's lesser-known birds in their homes, as well as a most comprehensive sketch of one of England's most attractive water-fowl.,In addition to the 82 photographs there are 11 pen-and-ink drawings and a frontispiece in Colour by Margaret Myddleton.
Haunts of British Divers