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IF YOU have ever wondered why the obsessive egg collector still exists, you have only to glance through this handsomely produced book. Birds’ Eggs (Eyewitness Handbooks, Dorling Kindersley, pp 256, £12.99) shows the eggs of some 500 species of birds, giving a vivid impression of the huge variety of shapes, sizes and colours of eggshells that exist. My favourites are the eggs of the red-winged tinamou, with their amazing, porcelain-like gloss. Michael Walters has supplied the concise and informed text, while the eggs are all reproduced life-size, with several examples given for each species covered. All were photographed at the Natural History Museum in London.