Product Description

Version 3.9 was released on July 31, 2007. Thayer Birding Software and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology have joined forces to create the ultimate CD for birders. The Thayer's Guide to Birds of North America v3.9 features all 925 birds seen in the U.S. or Canada (excluding Hawaii). This incredible Windows-based CD-ROM includes 2,788 color photos and songs for 708 species. 90 video clips are also included. This CD can help you identify unfamiliar birds. Simply select the color, size, habitat, location or sound of your bird and the program will show you everything that matches your description! Also included are 700 quizzes arranged into "Birding Hot Spots", "Christmas Bird Counts", Favorite Birds" and more. Set the level at Easy or crank it all the way up to Difficult. Select Multiple Choice, Fill-in-the-blank, Flash Card or "Pick One" quizzes. This CD also includes a listing and recordkeeping program to help you remember the birds you have seen. With version 3.9, you can also share Custom Lists with your friends, download songs and photos to an iPod for your own personal use and add your own comments and photos for each bird. New colorful icons make it very easy to use the CD. System Requirements: Windows 2000, XP or Vista; Pentium 4 processor or equivalent; 512 MB RAM; CD-ROM drive; 1 Gig on hard drive; plus hardware and software required to support multimedia applications. Some features of this CD-ROM require an Internet connection.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #703 in Software
• Brand: Thayer Birding Software
• ESRB Rating: Everyone
• Format: CD-ROM

Features

• Over 2800 color photos, 90 videos
• 708 Songs - export to iPod
• Hundreds of Quizzes
• Includes The Birder's Handbook
• 925 bird species

Customer Reviews

A Well Organized and Full Featured Program for Birders
My wife is an amateur birder. She previously used the Audubon software on a Windows PC for identifying birds and documenting her sightings. This program is better organized and, she thinks, more full featured. It was easy to install on our XP operating system and operates smoothly (I don't know about the Vista environment)and she says that it is fun to use with lots of interesting information.

Thayer's Guide to Birds
I am fairly happy with this program. I had a Peterson's program that I had used for years, but it was not compatible with XP or Vista. There were some things available in that program that are not in this one - like an easy to use life list, but the Peterson program is no longer available. Overall the program is easy to use and the bird id's are concise with pictures and vocalizations.

Good Program - Poor Installation Security
I like the operation and use of the software for identifying and exploring birds. However I had problems with the installation.

The provided installer does not allow use from Windows User accounts unless each User is given Administrator privilege. While most Windows customers never bother to change their accounts from Administrator to Limited, this is very bad security practice.

I left the entire "Program Files/Thayer Birding Software" directory tree read/execute only for Users, but had to set "/Database", "/Settings", and "/Temp" to User Full Control. All individual User files should have been in that User's My Documents.

greg
Systems Programmer for 35 years.
p.s. Basic computer security rule: "Do not do anything under Administrator except work that absolutely requires that permission, and then be very careful".