[wisb] Re: New Stokes guide, guides in general (no sightings)
- From: "B.G. Sloan" <bgsloan2@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wisbirdn <wisbirdn@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2010 17:43:42 -0700 (PDT)
I took a look at this book at the Mayfair Mall Barnes & Noble. Hefty book. I
read somewhere that it weighs three pounds, and I can attest to that. Neat
book, but not the kind of "field guide" you want to haul around while out in
the field.
Bernie Sloan
Milwaukee
--- On Wed, 10/27/10, Mike Duchek <mikeduchek@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
From: Mike Duchek <mikeduchek@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [wisb] New Stokes guide, guides in general (no sightings)
To: wisbirdn@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Wednesday, October 27, 2010, 4:27 PM
I was at Barnes and Noble the other day and wanted to look at this new Stokes
Field Guide. I have to say it's impressive as far as its scope (it has more
photos than most photo guides, and more species than most other field guides),
but that's also its drawback. It's a really big book, and I wonder how big is
too big before it's no longer a "field guide." I think it does not have as
large of page dimensions as Peterson or Sibley (the full NA ones, anyway), but
I think it may have been thicker. But don't quote me on that. On the other
hand, if you stay close to your car, what's the difference anyway how big it
is? But for me, I like to combine hiking/walking and birding, and so I kind of
do like to have smaller books to throw in my bag.
I also like a little info on behavior and habitat, which the old Audubon guides
were really good at. They are, however, now way out of date and arranged the
birds by color and appearance, which was nice starting out but no longer makes
sense to me. The Stokes guide focuses heavily on ID/appearance, and even
includes notes about subspecies. But I could largely do without this, as for
the most part I don't I am anywhere close to wanting to try to ID most birds by
subspecies (with some exceptions maybe, i.e., western scrub jay).
I am partial for some reason to National Geographic. I like the small size
(but comprehensive) and how they also put out a larger, hardcover book that
gives more info and has more species than even the new Stokes guide. I
recently checked out Peterson, Sibley and Kaufmann from the library too but
none of these blew me away so much that I really wanted to go out and get one
then and there. But since Christmas is coming, I would love to hear anyone's
thoughts on the best illustrated guide, or thoughts on the best guide in
general. I don't know if I'm inclined to get another one right now, but would
love to hear what people think after their years of experience.
As for photo guides, the photos in all of these recent guides are all great.
Hard to say one takes the prize for quality, though Stokes probably has the
prize for quantity and showing different views and variations of the same
species. I have Smithsonian but NWF looks pretty cool too. I also checked out
the NWF Tree Guide and I liked that one a lot as well though I haven't compared
tree guides very much.
Anyway, as best I know, these are the current general bird field guides out
there for North America.
Illustrated:
Sibley (2000/2003)
Peterson (2008/2010?)
National Geographic (2006)
Golden Guide (2001)
Photo:
Stokes (late 2010)
Smithsonian by Ted Floyd (2008)
NWF (2007)
Audubon (1994, eastern/western only, and pre-digital photography) very out of
date now but a lot of neat info in the back
Kaufmann (2005) - photos w/ white backgrounds
And there was that other guy who was doing a guide with "realistic" backgrounds
but I can't remember the guy's name or what the status of that is.
-Mike Duchek, Waukesha, Waukesha Co.
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