Works




Posthumous collectionsedit

  • John James Audubon, Selected Journals and Other Writings (Ben Forkner, ed.) (Penguin Nature Classics, 1996) ISBN 0-14-024126-4
  • John James Audubon, Writings & Drawings (Christoph Irmscher, ed.) (The Library of America, 1999) ISBN 978-1-883011-68-0
  • John James Audubon, The Audubon Reader (Richard Rhodes, ed.) (Everyman Library, 2006) ISBN 1-4000-4369-7
  • Audubon: Early Drawings (Richard Rhodes, Scott V. Edwards, Leslie A. Morris) (Harvard University Press and Houghton Library 2008) ISBN 978-0-674-03102-9
  • John James Audubon, Audubon and His Journals (The European Journals 1826–1829, the Labrador Journal 1833, the Missouri River Journals 1843), edited by Maria Audubon, volumes 1 and 2, originally published by Charles Scribner's Sons in 1897 (in Wikisource-logo.svg Wikisource).

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Banding experiment with Eastern Phoebes

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In volume 2 of Ornithological Biography (1834), Audubon told a story from his childhood, 30 years after the events reportedly took place, that has since garnered him the label of "first bird bander in America". The story has since been exposed as likely apocryphal. In the spring of 1804, according to the story, Audubon discovered a nest of the "Pewee Flycatcher", now known as Eastern Phoebe ( Sayornis phoebe ), in a small grotto on the property of Mill Grove. To determine whether the other phoebes on the property were "descended from the same stock", Audubon (1834:126) claimed that he tied silver threads to the legs of five nestlings: I took the whole family out, and blew off the exuviae of the feathers from the nest. I attached light threads to their legs: these they invariably removed, either with their bills, or with the assistance of their parents. I renewed them, however, until I found the little fellows habituated to them; and at last, when they we...
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Later career

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Audubon returned to America in 1829 to complete more drawings for his magnum opus. He also hunted animals and shipped the valued skins to British friends. He was reunited with his family. After settling business affairs, Lucy accompanied him back to England. Audubon found that during his absence, he had lost some subscribers due to the uneven quality of coloring of the plates. Others were in arrears in their payments. His engraver fixed the plates and Audubon reassured subscribers, but a few begged off. He responded, "'The Birds of America' will then raise in value as much as they are now depreciated by certain fools and envious persons." He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1830. He followed The Birds of America with a sequel Ornithological Biographies . This was a collection of life histories of each species written with Scottish ornithologist William MacGillivray. The two books were printed separately to avoid a British law requi...
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Starting out in business

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Audubon and Jean Ferdinand Rozier moved their merchant business partnership west at various stages, ending ultimately in Ste. Genevieve, Missouri, a former French colonial settlement west of the Mississippi River and south of St. Louis. Shipping goods ahead, Audubon and Rozier started a general store in Louisville, Kentucky on the Ohio River; when? the city had an increasingly important slave market and was the most important port between Pittsburgh and New Orleans. Soon he was drawing bird specimens again. He regularly burned his earlier efforts to force continuous improvement. He also took detailed field notes to document his drawings. Due to rising tensions with the British, President Jefferson ordered an embargo on British trade in 1808, adversely affecting Audubon's trading business. In 1810, Audubon moved his business further west to the less competitive Henderson, Kentucky, area. He and his small family took over an abandoned log cabin. In the fields and forests, Audubon wo...
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