When I arrived in Cookeville, Putnam County, Tennessee, during the summer of 1987, it became quickly apparent that a solid base of information about the birdlife of the county was already in existence, but it needed organization, so I set about the task of organizing, and adding to, that information. The result was Birds of Putnam County, Tennessee, the first edition of which appeared in hard copy in 1993 with a second online edition coming out in 2006.

    Becoming gradually enchanted with the surrounding Upper Cumberland Region of Kentucky and Tennessee, I began to focus my attention on other sites within that 26-county Region.  In particular, the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area held the focus of much of my attention beginning in 1993 and continuing for over a decade thereafter. At the same time my wife, Barbara H. Stedman, developed an interest in the birds of the Obed Wild and Scenic River.  The result of our focus on these two federal parks was Notes on the Birds of the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area and the Obed Wild and Scenic River, a small book we privately published in 2002.

     These ventures into the birdlife of a small county and two federal parks led me to think in terms of a somewhat larger canvas, a regional bird book providing a degree of intense focus that has seldom been directed at an area smaller than a state or province.  The result is this effort to characterize, in as much detail as possible, the birdlife of the Upper Cumberland Region of Kentucky and Tennessee.

     Many individuals have contributed to the effort to fill in the many blank spaces on the map of the Region; I hope all of them will be mentioned in the section of this work dealing with the field workers of the UCR; currently, only some of the deceased field workers are so named, but to each of the others [especially my late wife Barbara], I offer my thanks.

14 February 2011, Cookeville, Tennessee                                                               SJS