Audubon's First Octavo

These are the framed prints. The top picture is a pair of Spotted Towhees - it is entitled Towhe Ground Finch. These prints were made between 1839 and 1844, so before the Prophet Joseph's death. They were painted by John James Audubon as noted in the bottom left and then printed by lithograph by J.T. Bowen -this means printed from a stone carving in black and then each was hand colored.

This is one of my favorite Aububon images. Before him the birds were depicted in a very stilted, non-alive look. But he captured them in motion in actual settings where they might live. Quite an accomplishment when you remember he had no camera to record the details, only his notes and sketch books and the shot birds at hand. This is called Pinnated Grouse, today we would call them the Heath Hen subspecies (extinct) of the Greater Prairie Chicken

This is a pair of Dickcissel. Called Black Throated Bunting at the time by Audubon.

Bullock's Troopial -really interesting how that became Bullock's Oriole. This is a western species not the more typical Oriole of the east.

Below is a Black-Headed Grosbeak, called a Black-Headed Song Grosbeak. These are typical western birds seen in Utah and California. One must remember that Audubon lived and worked most of his life in the east.