What happened? Our BIRD: The Definitive Visual Guide giveaway has been going so well, swimmingly in fact. Then suddenly, the river of stupendous submissions has dwindled down to a trickle. Maybe you’re all suffering from giveaway fatigue. Perhaps you fear that you’re not worthy of a avifaunal epic like BIRD. It’s even possible that you (gasp) have other things on your mind right now. Well, put all that aside. We’re so interested in your holiday gift ideas for birders that we’re sweetening the pot for participation! Our fine friends at Houghton Mifflin have graciously tendered three coveted books for this giveaway, increasing your odds of being a winner by 300%! How can you ignore those odds?

So, send me one excellent suggestion for what you would buy for the birder you love, like, or simply have to shop for by Wednesday, December 12. Corey, Charlie, and I will sort through the suggestions and do a little giving of our own. The contributors of our four favorite ideas will each receive one of the following books:

Bird
Awesome! Read my review.

All Things Reconsidered: My Birding Adventures
Awesome! Read my review.

Good Birders Don\'t Wear White: 50 Tips From North America\'s Top Birders
Awesome! Read my review.

Peterson Reference Guides: Gulls of the Americas (Peterson Reference Guides)
Awesome! Read my review and Charlie’s review.

Let me honest… I love every one of these books. In fact, if I didn’t already own them all, they’d make perfect gifts. We’ve got the magnum opus of avifauna, the collected wisdom of assorted North American masters, the collected wisdom of perhaps THE North American master, and a comprehensive text on American gulls so good you’re actually going to want to go out and look at some. Any one of these can be yours.

Send in your suggestion and specify which of these you’d like best. While I can’t guarantee you’ll get your favorite book, I can confirm that you’ve got to be in it to win it! As an added bonus, we’ll be publishing all the gift ideas in the hopes of assuaging everyone else’s last-minute giving needs.

Written by Mike
Mike is a leading authority in the field of standardized test preparation, but he's also a traveler who fully expects to see every bird in the world. Besides founding 10,000 Birds in 2003, Mike has also created a number of other entertaining but now extirpated nature blog resources, particularly the Nature Blog Network and I and the Bird.