Mountainfit

My friend and fellow Field Museum volunteer Meera Lee Sethi has written a book. I am so pleased to share this with you, because I know that a lot of sweat, and love went in to this little project. 

Meera, like me, started out volunteering in the Field bird lab without any prior experience of preparing bird skins. Over time she has become very skilled at making study skins, and has contributed immensely to the integrity of the bird colletions. 

Not too long ago, Meera spent a summer in the mountains of Sweden working as a field volunteer helping to research the Great Snipe Gallinago media. Meera walked many miles through mountain wilderness, crossed white, roiling rivers, and endured the elements to track this somewhat elusive bird. She did all of this and even had time to stop and cuddle a couple of baby lemmings. Mountainfit is her collection of essays documenting this experience. 

Meera was kind enough to hire me to do the cover painting, and I was honored. The bird sitting on top of the mountain is a Snow Bunting; a bird that Meera encountered up at higher mountain altitudes. 

You can acquaint yourself with Meera's wonderful writing through her site The Science Essayist, as well as purchase a digital copy of Mountainfit here. I encourage you to do so. It' a little gem.