The Snoring Bird: My Family’s Journey Through a Century of Biology by Bernd Heinrich

Intriguing memoir of father and son zoologists

Bernd Heinrich is a German-American entomologist, ornithologist, and professor of biology at the University of Vermont. In addition to his scientific papers published in academic journals, he has written quite a few books on science and nature for the general public. Bernd’s father Gerd Heinrich (1896–1984) was a self-taught naturalist, zoologist, and entomologist. The Snoring Bird, published in 2007, is a dual (auto)biography, written by Bernd Heinrich, about his father’s life as well as his own. The title refers to a rare Indonesian bird, the snoring rail or Celebes rail, that Gerd pursued on behalf of the American Museum of Natural History. This father-son memoir provides a revealing look into the lives and research pursuits of these two scientists. By following the arcs of their scientific careers, the reader gains an understanding of how practices and priorities in the field of biology have changed over the past century.

Bernd Heinrich’s upbringing was uncommon, to say the least. His father was involved in unconventional relationships with women that amounted to unofficial polygamy, with three—sometimes four, perhaps—wives/lovers living together in the same household. One of these was Bernd’s biological mother, but for all intents and purposes he was raised by three moms. Though the Heinrich family was German by heritage, they owned a feudal estate called Borowke, located at times (and currently) within Poland. When World War II broke out, the Heinrichs found themselves caught between the Germans and the Russians. Gerd, though firmly anti-Nazi, enlisted in the Luftwaffe (German air force) to avoid execution. When Bernd was five years old, the family fled to West Germany just ahead of the Communist invasion. Several years later they emigrated to the United States.

Throughout all this turmoil, one constant in the family’s life was a love of nature. Gerd Heinrich traveled all over the world gathering animal specimens, some for his own studies and many for natural history museums. In his personal area of expertise, ichneumon wasps, he named over 1,000 new species. Bernd Heinrich began assisting his father at a young age, gathering wasps and taxidermizing small mammals. After the family fled Poland, they lived for several years in a cabin on a West German nature preserve, where Bernd developed a love for the outdoors. Later the Heinrichs settled on a farm in Maine, where Bernd would spend all day out in the woods and meadows, engaged in entomological and zoological activities.

I had previously read A Naturalist at Large: The Best Essays of Bernd Heinrich, and I found it rather boring. Though I share Heinrich’s love for birds, I am less than fascinated by the minutiae of his insect research. Overall, however, I found The Snoring Bird quite captivating. I was more enthralled by the first half of the book (mostly about Gerd), because of its World Wars and exotic expeditions, than the second half (mostly about Bernd). Like just about every autobiography these days, there’s an element of “Daddy didn’t love me the way he should.” Bernd working out his father issues doesn’t become overly obtrusive or annoying, however, because the bulk of the book concentrates on the science. The interweaving of science writing and personal memoir provides an enlightening vicarious look into the life of a biologist. One really gets an understanding of the practical work behind the intellectual pursuits. This book also sheds light on science history—biology in particular—by relating how geographical exploration, taxonomy, and description (Gerd’s domains) fell out of favor, to be supplanted by experimentation, DNA analysis, and the formulation of theories on behavioral evolution (Bernd’s world). If you’re a natural scientist, or have ever dreamed of being one, The Snoring Bird is a very stimulating read.