U2414008@ucsvc.ucs.unimelb.edu.au (12/12/90)
I am going to Mexico, Belize and Guatemala in January and I need some recommen- dations for a good field guide. I have one (can't remember the author) but the pictures don't look all that good and are grouped all together, separate from the description pages. Can anyone suggest a good book for this area, preferably one with the pictures and descriptions on adjacent pages? Also, if anyone has suggestions for good bird-watching spots, or what I am likely to see in general at that time of year, it would be much appreciated. In Mexico, I am going to Oaxaca and then around the Yucatan peninsula; in Belize, to San Ignacio and that area; and in Guatemala, to Tikal. Thanks in advance for any advice. Koren Mitchell Senior Technical Officer School of Dental Science University of Melbourne Melbourne, Victoria, Australia e-mail: u2414008@ucsvc.ucs.unimelb.edu.au PS Being in Australia, it is not easy to get field guides for other countries, but I will be in California over Christmas (Bay Area) so I could buy books there.
misan@ra.abo.fi (Annika Forsten DC) (12/12/90)
In article <1381@ucsvc.ucs.unimelb.edu.au> U2414008@ucsvc.ucs.unimelb.edu.au writes: > I am going to Mexico, Belize and Guatemala in January and I need some recommen- > dations for a good field guide. I have one (can't remember the author) but the > pictures don't look all that good and are grouped all together, separate from > the description pages. Can anyone suggest a good book for this area, preferably > one with the pictures and descriptions on adjacent pages? Also, if anyone has > suggestions for good bird-watching spots, or what I am likely to see in general > at that time of year, it would be much appreciated. In Mexico, I am going to > Oaxaca and then around the Yucatan peninsula; in Belize, to San Ignacio and > that area; and in Guatemala, to Tikal. > Thanks in advance for any advice. I suppose the one you have is by Peterson. As far as I know there aren't any really good ones. There is a newly revised book 'A Field Guide to the Birds of Mexico' by Ernest P. Edwards. I think I have this book and I wasn't very impressed. It is however rather thin and light to carry and it should (according to ads) depict more than 870 Mexican species, 350 more than any other field guide. So I'd say it's probably a good complement to Peterson. There is also a new edition of Peterson (1989) in spanish with 39 plates. You will probably need a US-guide as well, maybe the NGS guide. There is a 1989 edition of the Peterson guide but I don't know whether any changes have been made to it. Ernest P. Edwards has also written a site-finding guide 'Finding Birds in Mexico' with 1985 supplement. A Checklist for the Birds of Belize is also available. ABA Sales has these items on their list, but I think it is too late to order them to Australia. You'll probably have to find a really good bookstore in California to find books on birds outside the US, but Mexico should be among the easiest countries. You could get some tripreports from Steve Whitehouse, 5 Stanway Close, Blackpole, Worcester WR4 9XL, UK. But there isn't time to send those to Australia, you'd have to give an adress in California. In case you really wish to try that his phonenumber is (0905) 54541. > PS Being in Australia, it is not easy to get field guides for other countries, I also always have these problems. It may take half a year to gather the material for a foreign trip. Annika Forsten, Finland misan@ra.abo.fi
bob@delphi.uchicago.edu (Robert S. Lewis, Jr.) (12/13/90)
In article <1381@ucsvc.ucs.unimelb.edu.au> U2414008@ucsvc.ucs.unimelb.edu.au writes: >I am going to Mexico, Belize and Guatemala in January and I need some recommen- >dations for a good field guide. I've never had the chance to birdwatch in Mexico, so I can't judge which of the Mexican and Central American Guides are most useful, but I would suggest bringing a good North American guide (like the National Geographic Guide) along with you, because I think many of the Mexican and Central American guides widely available in the US are written with the assumption that they will be used by US birders who are already completely familiar with the many US birds that also occur in Mexico. The guides, therefore, tend to provide only brief descriptions of the birds common to the US and Mexico. If you don't already know US birds, you'll probably find the Mexican field guides inadequate by themselves.
dgraham@kean.ucs.mun.ca (David Graham) (12/13/90)
In article <1990Dec12.165646.28302@midway.uchicago.edu>, bob@delphi.uchicago.edu (Robert S. Lewis, Jr.) writes: > > I've never had the chance to birdwatch in Mexico, so I can't judge > which of the Mexican and Central American Guides are most useful, but > I would suggest bringing a good North American guide (like the > National Geographic Guide) along with you, because I think many of the > Mexican and Central American guides widely available in the US are > written with the assumption that they will be used by US birders who > are already completely familiar with the many US birds that also occur > in Mexico. The guides, therefore, tend to provide only brief > descriptions of the birds common to the US and Mexico. If you don't > already know US birds, you'll probably find the Mexican field guides > inadequate by themselves. This is an excellent suggestion, I think. The Peterson Mexican Field Guide simply refers you to his other guides for a lot of common N.A. species, so the Mexican guide *by itself* is not that useful. Despite what Annika says, however, the Peterson Mexican guide has been highly recommended to me by a birder here with a lot of tropical experience and several Mexican trips. The one to stay away from is Irby Davis' _A Field Guide to the Birds of Mexico and Central America_--it has lots of illustrations of different subspecies, but almost all are treated as valid species, and he has invented a ton of non-standard names for them, which makes actually trying to *use* the book next to impossible. -- *************************************************************************** David Graham dgraham@kean.ucs.mun.ca ***************************************************************************
sandee@sun16.scri.fsu.edu (Daan Sandee) (12/13/90)
In article <1381@ucsvc.ucs.unimelb.edu.au> U2414008@ucsvc.ucs.unimelb.edu.au writes: >I am going to Mexico, Belize and Guatemala in January and I need some recommen- >dations for a good field guide. .. [..] > >PS Being in Australia, it is not easy to get field guides for other countries, >but I will be in California over Christmas (Bay Area) so I could buy books >there. R.T.Peterson, A Field Guide to Mexican Birds, Houghton, Mifflin, 1973. $18. Excellent drawings, good descriptions, distribution information sketchy. Color plates separate from text. Main drawback : intended for North American birders. You are expected to know and recognize the North American birds, although this book does list them in the text and gives their distribution. So you definitely need a North American field guide. This book supposedly also covers Belize and Guatemala but I don't know how well. E.P.Edwards, A Field Guide to the Birds of Mexico, available from the author, Box AQ, Sweet Briar, VA 24595. $20. Artwork reasonable. Descriptions and distribution good but cryptic (you have to learn all his abbreviations). Lists ALL Mexican birds including the N.Am. ones. Plates separate from text. Birding guides: E.P.Edwards, Finding Birds in Mexico (with suppl.) $26.50. Lots of good information but much is wildly out of date. It covers field trips by the author between 1970 and 1984. These are the books I have used. Otherwise, I can only quote the ABA catalog. Steve Howell, Field Checklist to Birds of Mexico. $4.25. Barbara Mackinnon Vda. de Montes : 100 Common Birds of the Yucatan, $27.50 Stiles and Skutch, A Guide to the birds of Costa Rica, $35. Taylor, Birding in Costa Rica. $17.50. Wood et al., Checklist of the birds of Belize, $2. All these available from the ABA, 1-800-634-7736 (1-719-634-7736 from abroad). You can buy a North American field guide in any good bookshop in the U.S. For the other books, you might find them in the gift shop of the Museum of Natural History in San Francisco (in Golden Gate Park). I remember quite a collection of bird books. While in San Francisco, you might want to contact Steve Howell of the Point Reyes Bird Observatory in Stinson Beach (don't have a phone number). He is one of the best experts on Mexico. The PRBO is open to the public at odd times but probably not around Christmas. Daan Sandee sandee@sun16.scri.fsu.edu Supercomputer Computations Research Institute Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL 32306-4052 (904) 644-7045
misan@ra.abo.fi (Annika Forsten DC) (12/20/90)
In article <170104@kean.ucs.mun.ca> dgraham@kean.ucs.mun.ca (David Graham) writes: > This is an excellent suggestion, I think. The Peterson Mexican Field > Guide simply refers you to his other guides for a lot of common N.A. > species, so the Mexican guide *by itself* is not that useful. Despite > what Annika says, however, the Peterson Mexican guide has been highly > recommended to me by a birder here with a lot of tropical experience I'm sorry, but I can't remember having said anything bad about the Peterson guide, it was Edward's guide I wasn't too impressed with. I'd bring them both along though, as well as a good US-guide. I quite agree that you'll need a US-guide for the species that also occur in US. But like someone said, the Spanish Peterson guide includes part of the US-species. annika forsten, finland