Customer Reviews

Aquatic Entomology: The Fishermen's Guide and Ecologists' Illustrated Guide to Insects and Their Relatives (Crosscurrents)

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McCafferty's authoritative work is directed at the nonspecialist, particularly anglers with a scientific bent and ecologists who are not entomologists. It is widely used as a basic text for aquatic entomology in universities, as well. It provides keys for insect families, detailed descriptions of orders, extensive information on life histories and habitats, and is sumptuously illustrated with line drawings, many in color, by A. V. Provonsha. It is the most complete and accessible work on the aquatic entomology of North America north of Mexico. It belongs on the shelf of every serious angler-entomologist.

A few of the taxa have changed names since the publication of the book in 1981, but this shouldn't prove to be problem for the intended audience.

I have personally taken an upper level Aquatic Entomology course from Dr. McCafferty at Purdue University. McCafferty's text is very well done, and very easy to use. The 'flow-chart' style identification keys are perfect for the non formally-trained entomologist. The illustrations are by Arwin Provonsha (who is also at Purdue Universtity). Arwin is one of the best scientific illustrators I have seen. Definately top-notch work! Some taxa are a bit out of date, notably the Hydrophilidae, but that is hardly a problem. Hopefully a revision will be published in the near future to keep this wonderful text current.

The book is now quite old. There have been several regroupings at the family level since this book has been published so even if you use it correctly, you can incorrectly identify insects. Also, if you are serious about identifying aquatic insects, the family-level keys of this book are insufficient to give your work credibility. Those are the two problems with this book... 1- it is a little out of date AND 2- it is a limited tool for identifying organisms.

All that aside, it is a very good book to teach the CONCEPTS of taxonomy to students. The keys have nice flow charts that teach students to make the kinds of decisions that they need identify insects.

Does it have legs? Or not?
Does it have wings? Or not?
Does it have one claw? Or two?

The keys use pictures so that the process does not become bogged down in terminology. Thus I highly recommend it to teachers and to parents that are helping there child build their own entomology collection. I keep a copy for work shops.

The color plates in the back are beautiful and help convey the appearance of specimens in life. Most of the book has nice grey-scale illustrations.

The Author is a mayfly specialist... one of THE mayfly specialists in the world...

If you are interested in this book there are other titles you may find interesting. Try Reese Voshell's book if you are interested in teaching insects to older kids, or for watershed monitoring groups. [2002: A Guide to Common Freshwater Invertebrates of North America]; it also contains lots of interesting ecologic information.

If you are interested general taxonomy of aquatic insects, try Merritt and Cummins 1996 [An Introduction to the Aquatic Insects of North America]. It provides the best keys to genus-level for most insects. But be aware that a new edition should be out in 2 years or so... this book is not real friendly if you have not had a college-level entomology... but i heard a rumor that that there will be a nice glossary in the new edition that should make it more accessible...

of course not all aquatic invertebrates are insects... if you are interested in these critters (amphipods, snails, etc) try Thrope and Covich 2002 [Ecology and Classification of Freshwater Invertebrates]

Note that, for genus-level-taxonomy, the last two books will require access to a medium to High-quality dissecting microscope and may require a compound microscope. The Books by McCafferty and by Voshell do not require as much magnification...

If you would like further information you can email me and I will be glad to help. brett@thebugguy.org

This book is amazingly beautiful. The illustrations alone make it worth the money. As an aquatic entomologist who teaches an aquatic entomology lab to college students, I find this book to be an invaluable source of high quality images for use in my classes. The pictorial keys are also very helpful - they are very easy to follow and make it almost a simplistic task for a lay person to identify aquatic insects down to the family level. Some of these keys are a little outdated since publication of the book, but they are still helpful for the most part.

My only complaint with this book is that it doesn't go into as much scientific detail as is necessary for a serious student of entomology. Still, this isn't meant to be a textbook or an identification manual for complex identifications lower than the family level. If the book is used as intended by fishermen and ecologists, this is a very helpful book.

And did I mention the ilustrations are amazing?

Are we talking about Jaws?

Nope. Bugs.

And not just any bugs. These bad boys are terrifying.

For instance we learn about the larvae of the spongilla (rhymes with Godzilla) fly. These "soft-bodied, bristled forms" are equipped with "mouthparts...highly modified into a needle like sucking apparatus".

Yikes! What do these things suck on???

Then there is the giant water bug (Family Belostommatidae) complete with raptorial forelegs with one or two claws each. Clearly excited by these revolting monsters, the author writes, "These spectacular bugs are also known colloquially by several names: (1) fish killers, because they are voracious and will attack small fishes and other small animals such as ducklings; (2) electric light bugs, because dispersing adults are often attracted to lights at night, often far from water; and (3) toe biters, for obvious reasons".

OK - you're beginning to get the idea.

There are 448 pages of this stuff, complete with magnified illustrations and a lurid set of overly lifelike color plates, astoundingly introduced with a quotation from the poem Pied Beauty by Gerard Manley Hopkins ("Glory to God for dappled things...").

It must be said that this book contains much entomological science (of interest to I'm not sure whom), as well as tidbits of information that will add to the arsenal of the most committed of fly fishermen only.

Recommended for these constituencies - otherwise open at your own risk.

I've had my copy of Aquatic Entomology for almost 15 years now. I still refer to it quite often. It's a great first text for someone wanting to learn the craft of identification of aquatic insects. This IS a technical book, but not as technical as some (Merrit and Cummings for example). If your a fisherman who only wants to know what a Mayfly, Caddisfly or Stonefly looks like, then this book is not for you. This book also assumes some basic knowledge of aquatic insects. If you want to be able to recognize the major families of these (and other) orders than this is a great book to start with. There is a lot of information for the fisherman who is willing to "read between the lines". Know the basic natural history of certain insect groups will help one to be a better fisherman. This text also gives the basics of aquatic insect collection and storage. There is a tremendous world of diversity in our streams, rivers and lakes. This is a great book to help one unlock the key to this world.

This book is very detailed and gives accurate descriptions of all aquatic insects. The pictures with in each chapter also depict what the specimen look like. With all the information on the aquatic insects that is provide by this book it would be hard to believe that there is a better book out there.

I ordered from mail service and wish I hadn't. This book should be viewed first. Classification outdated. This book was too technical and incomplete. A very small portion was intended for fly fishers. The cost of this book would be better applied to many more up to date books designed for fly fishers interested in identification.

This is a must have for fly fishermen looking to study entomology as it applies to fishing and fly tying. I saw this book at my local Orvis store (reference only) and one look told me I needed it in my library. The plates and drawings are fantastic. This is a detailed study, but not over the head of most fly fishermen. Match it with Gary Lafontaine's "Caddisflies", Shane Stalcup's "Mayflies - Top to Bottom" and/or Dave Hugh's "Matching Mayflies" and you have the start of a good entomology library for fly fishermen.
Aquatic Entomology even has sections marked by a small image of a tied fly, which are of special interest to the fisherman. Get this book!!

Very little information is inserted that is of benefit to the flyfisher. Classifications are outdated and most of the text is complicated and useless. Some of the pictures (drawings) were great. It helped in identifying some of the basic insects.