Where in Northern Nevada do the Red-necked Phalaropes roam?

And at what lake can residents creep up on Brown Creepers?

Find the answers to that plus the best spots to spot Sooty Grouse, Ruddy Ducks, Calliope hummingbirds, bald eagles and a flock of other fowl in the new edition of “A Birding Guide to Reno and Beyond.”

Issued by the Lahontan Audubon Society, this second edition costs $10 for a 59-page booklet that provides detailed directions and maps to sites where bird-lovers can find their favorite feathered friends at different times of the year.

Karen Kish, president of the Lahontan Audubon Society, describes it as a “roadmap of places to go and birds to see” at the best birding spots within an 80-mile radius of Reno.

The book lists 20 areas, including several in and around Reno as well as in Carson City, the Lake Tahoe Basin and California’s Sierra Valley.

A how-to-get-there section provides the mileage and time required to reach each area, what species will be there, suggestions for possible side trips and precautions drivers might need to take to survive summer heat and wet or snowy driving conditions.

The book does not include photos of birds to help people identify them because that would require a much lengthier publication, Kish said.

The booklet’s introduction does recommend several popular bird identification guides available at most book stores or online. They include “Kenn Kaufman’s “Birds of North America,” and David Allen Sibley’s “The Sibley Field Guide to Birds of Western North America.”

Updated since the publication of the first “A Birding Guide to Reno and Beyond” in 2000, the new edition mentions the acquisition of wetlands in Carson Valley by the Nature Conservancy; a floating boardwalk and other features at Swan Lake in Lemmon Valley; and a viewing platform with interpretive panels at Stillwater Point at the Stillwater National Wildlife Refuge near Fallon.

The purpose of the guide is to help the public enjoy the beauty of birds and learn about their behaviors, said Kish, who co-edited the book with Alan Gubanich, the Lahontan Audubon Society’s vice president.

“There are a lot of reasons why people bird,” Kish said. “And part of it is the pure aesthetics because when you see a bird through binoculars, you see a lot more detail.”

Looking for a certain species becomes almost like a treasure hunt, she said.

“When you know a bird migrates to a certain area, if you find it, it’s very exciting.”

There also is another reason for encouraging people to enjoy the beauty of birds and their vital place in the ecosystem, Kish said.

“Often an appreciation for birds leads to improving their habitat,” she said. “On a more serious note, birds are pretty sensitive to the environment and to habitat changes.”

Kish said birds are considered an ‘indicator’ set of species, the canaries in the global coal mine sensitive to toxins and other environmental shifts that eventually can threaten humankind.

“So if they get out of balance and suddenly your neighborhood changes to having nothing but pigeons, you know something has happened. And the human species is part of the web of life.”