Sony or Nikon

I owned a Sony A77 before swapping over to a Nikon D7000. Sony is easier to use and its electronic viewfinder allows you to check exposure prior to taking a photo. This, coupled with the abilty to check highlights in maual mode before shooting make this camera a winner. These two features are essential when photographying birds due to the minimal time you have before a bird moves and the fact that many birds are very small and in obscure places. I swapped over to Nikon purely because of the range of lens and particularly because of the cost of the Sony f4 500 lens which was $5K more than the Nikon equivalent.

The Nikon D7000 is however, probably a more "professional" camera and much better in low light.

If you dont do birds though, dont mind the limitation of lens and dont do a lot of low light shooting, then I would opt for the Sony.

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toucan