Michel Ottaviani et le premier volume de la « Monographie des Fringilles »

The first volume of the « Monographie des Fringilles » by Michel Ottaviani was paruted in in December 2008. It deals with 64 species belonging to 20 different genera divided up in two sub-families: Fringillins (Fringilla) and Carduelins (Mycerobas, Eophona, Hesperiphona, Coccothraustes, Pyrrhoplectes, Leucosticte, Callacanthis, Haematospiza, Carpodacus, Uragus, Pinicola, Propyrrhula, Chaunoproctus, Pyrrhula, Loxia, Bucanetes, Rhodopechys, Rhodospiza et Rhynchostruthus)
This book presents the last informations regarding taxonomy and phylogeny of these species, their characteristics (description, distribution, subspecies, name, habitat, nutrition, morals, voice, mating, nesting behaviour, migrations and, if useful, statuted). There’s a distribution map in colors for each species.
The major interest of this work is that all the species, even the rarest ones, are illustrated by photos took in a natural environment, which was never done before. Some photos describes behaviors that were never described before, and reveal new exploited plants as food.
This work, full of informations and magnificently illustrated (around 500 photos), is absolutely unique.
The monography can be ordered at a price of 45 € + 5,65 € of shipping costs (France and E.U.) on the website www.editions-prin.fr.
We interviewed Michel Ottaviani, who tells us more about this monography and about Fringillines.