Bill Thompson III, (born on ?)

Bill Thompson, III, is the editor of Bird Watcher's Digest, the popular bimonthly magazine that has been published by his family since 1978. An avid bird watcher from the age of eight, Bill knew that birds would someday become the focus of his career, in addition to being his main hobby. He holds a bachelor of philosophy degree from Western College at Miami University of Ohio.

Bill worked as a professional musician and was a senior account executive at the advertising firm of Ogilvy & Mather in New York prior to joining Bird Watcher's Digest. In January of 1995, he became the magazine's editor.

Bill is the author of the best-selling book Bird Watching For Dummies, part of the wildly popular For Dummies series from IDG Books/John Wiley & Sons. He has written several popular booklets for backyard bird watchers, including The Backyard Bird Watcher's Answer Guide, and An Identification Guide to Backyard Birds. Bill edits the Backyard Booklet Series for Bird Watcher's Digest. This series includes 13 titles and has sold more than 5 million copies since its inception. His regular column "Bill's Top Ten" appears in each issue of The Backyard Bird Newsletter and consistently tops the publication's reader surveys.

He is the author of 18 state bird books in the Bird Watching: A Year-Round Guide series from Cool Springs Press. And he is the lead author of Identify Yourself: Birding's 50 Most Common ID Challenges (2005) from Houghton Mifflin, which is illustrated by his wife Julie Zickefoose.

His articles on birds and birding have appeared in many books, including Natural Gardening For Birds (Rodale Organic Living Press, 2001) and periodicals, including National Gardening magazine, Cooking Light, and BottomLine Personal.

Bill Thompson is a skilled birder, a rara avis who likes people just as much as he does birds. A crack "shot" with a spotting scope, Bill can get a jumpy warbler in his sights before you can say "It just flew!" It is his great delight and special talent to treat other bird watchers to up-close views of hard-to-see birds. Outgoing and funny, Bill enlivens bird walks and programs at birding festivals with his not-so-dry humor and ever-present guitar. Not surprisingly, he's in constant demand both as an entertainer and trip leader at festivals across the country. He has given keynote presentations at more than 40 such events since 1998.

Bill is a frequent guest on bird and nature radio shows and often serves as a consultant on editorial projects, on birding ecotourism, as well as on product development for the wild bird and birding industry.

He is a director of the Ohio Ornithological Society and a longtime member of The American Birding Association. He is the founder of The Whipple Bird Club.

He has trekked to many of the world's great birding hotspots including sites in Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and Central America. But some of his favorite bird watching is done near home, on the 80-acre farm in the rolling, wooded hills outside of Whipple, Ohio, that he shares with his wife, artist/author Julie Zickefoose, and their children, Phoebe and Liam.

When he is not playing with his children, or watching birds, Bill likes to play guitar with his (locally) popular bands, Chick Sandwich, and The Swinging Orangutangs, which includes his wife Julie and his brother Andy.