I want to thank Haans, Matt, and Terri for not only their posts announcing the Atlas book, but also for all their contributions to the project over the years. The success of OBBAII is ultimately the result of the incredible effort of hundreds of volunteers. Hopefully, this volume is of great use to birders, land managers, and researchers throughout the state. This book is certainly not meant to be a replacement for fantastic books like Peterjohn's *Birds of Ohio*. We have cited these works extensively and list several important Ohio books for additional reading. If I may take a moment to address one of Haans' points though, specifically that "...*due to differences in methods and effort, the comparisons over time cannot be viewed as conclusive.*" In Chapter 3 (Survey Design and Analytical Methods) you'll find that much care was taken in ensuring direct comparison of results in *priority blocks* between atlas periods. Statistically significant trends are noted where applicable and should be considered valid. Drivers of trends however were not assessed directly at this time (additional research is underway) and since neither abundance data nor occurrence data in non-priority blocks were collected during the first Atlas, direct comparisons cannot be made for those data. Given the comparability of occurrence data within priority blocks we hope that additional researchers will take the opportunity to work with the rich Atlas dataset, and the Ohio Division of Wildlife will likely be the caretaker of the database into the future. As Terri mentioned, I'll be giving a talk this Friday night at the Watershed Stewardship Center at West Creek Reservation in Parma. I will have a small number of books with me in case anyone wants to get a copy there. Event details here: http://www.clevelandmetroparks.com/Main/EventsProgramsCalendar/Science-Lecture-Putting-Nesting-Birds-on-the-Map-8219.aspx Our publisher, Penn State University Press, has been incredible to work with and they will continue to offer the book at a reduced priced for a limited time. You can get 30% off the list price by ordering directly from PSU Press here: http://www.psupress.org/books/titles/978-0-271-07127-5.html along with the order code OH16. Thanks again to everyone who contributed to the Atlas. Please don't hesitate to contact me directly with questions. ~Matt -- ****************************************************** Matthew Shumar Project Coordinator - Ohio Breeding Bird Atlas II Research Associate II - The Ohio State University Columbus, Ohio ______________________________________________________________________ Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society. Please consider joining our Society, at www.ohiobirds.org/site/membership.php. Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list. You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at: listserv.miamioh.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask]