Meet the editor

Heimo Mikkola, born in Finland in 1945, has been a bird-watcher since the age of eleven, but has concentrated on owls since 1965. His thesis for his MSc was on the great grey owl, and his Ph.D. thesis was on the ecological relationships of European owls. In 1988, Dr. Mikkola became an adjunct professor at the University of Eastern Finland. His life-long international career with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the Unit-

ed Nations started in 1974 in Colombia and ended with him as the resident representative of FAO in Uruguay in 2007. In 2014, he was nominated as "Champion of Owls" in Houston, USA, mainly because of his worldwide distributed and translated owl books. Thus far, he has written some 300 papers and more than 10 books on birds. Since retirement, he has edited eight books with IntechOpen.

Contents

**Section 1**

**Section 2**

and Evolution in Birds *by Michael Wink*

in Marine Ecosystems

*by Roelof D. Coertze and Arie M. Rijke*

*Sood A. Ndimuligo and Pius Y. Kavana*

and Land Birds

and Challenges

**Section 3**

**Preface XI**

Systematics and Taxonomy **1**

**Chapter 1 3**

Bird Colours and Feather Structure **23**

**Chapter 2 25**

**Chapter 3 39**

Abundances and Distribution **49**

**Chapter 4 51**

**Chapter 5 71**

DNA Analyses Have Revolutionized Studies on the Taxonomy

Haloarchaea May Contribute to the Colour of Avian Plumage

*by Rosa María Martínez-Espinosa and Javier Torregrosa-Crespo*

Viscous Drag Reduction and Contour Feather Geometry in Water

Seabirds of the Benguela Ecosystem: Utilisation, Long-Term Changes

Avifauna in Relation to Habitat Disturbance in Wildlife Management

*Alistair M. McInnes, Desmond Tom and Robert J.M. Crawford*

Areas of the Ruvuma Miombo Ecosystem, Southern Tanzania *by Ally K. Nkwabi, John K. Bukombe, Hamza K. Kija, Steven D. Liseki,* 

*by Azwianewi B. Makhado, Rodney Braby, Bruce M. Dyer, Jessica Kemper,* 
