Birds of Eastern North America: A Photographic Guide (Princeton Field Guides) [Paperback]

Paul Sterry (Author), Brian E. Small (Author)

Book Description

Series: Princeton Field Guides | Publication Date: September 21, 2009

Combining informative and accessible text, up-to-date maps, and--above all--stunning color photographs, this is the best and most lavishly illustrated photographic guide to the birds of eastern North America. All of the images have been carefully selected to convey both the sheer beauty and the key identification features of each bird, and many of the photos are larger than those found in other guides. Wherever possible, a variety of plumages are pictured, providing visual coverage and usefulness matching any artwork-illustrated field guide. And many of the images are state-of-the-art digital photographs by Brian Small, one of North America's finest bird photographers. These pictures, many seen here for the first time, reproduce a previously unimaginable level of detail. Finally, the ranges of nearly all species are shown on maps from the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, the authority on North American birding. New and experienced birders alike will find this guide indispensable: the clear layout will help novices easily identify the birds they see, while the superb photographs will help seasoned birders confirm identifications.

• The best, most lavishly illustrated photographic guide to the region's birds
• Larger color photos than most other field guides
• Fresh contemporary design--clear, easy-to-use, and attractive
• Informative, accessible, and authoritative text
• Range maps from the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology
• Covers entire eastern half of mainland North America and the arctic and subarctic territorial islands of the U.S. and Canada

Editorial Reviews

Review

The ultimate handbook to accompany you in the field or while bird watching at home. . . . [A]n excellent visual reference for the identification of birds. -- Joel Lerner, Washington Post



Brian Small and co-author Paul Sterry have taken the photo-based field guide to a new level. Their new books are beautifully designed and well written. Photos are tack-sharp, and tightly cropped, giving close-up views of each bird. -- Matt Mendenhall, Birder's World



Whether you are a birding fanatic or someone who enjoys looking in their backyard to see what shows up, there is a new bird guide that will fill your need. . . . With great photos of more than 500 species, this is a wonderful photographic guide making identification of birds that much easier. Both the Eastern and Western versions are great gift ideas. -- Ken Moran, New York Post



The large, excellent photos, combined with the overall design, make this probably the most attractive general field guide I've seen. . . . This is the first field guide that I would recommend to bird photography aficionados solely on the merit of the pictures, irrespective of its value as a field guide. Finally, the exceptional, large photographs make these an attractive primary field guide option for new and burgeoning birders. -- Grant McCreary, Birder's Library



These guides will be most useful for intermediate level birders. -- Ian Paulsen, Birdbooker Report



Excellent state-of-the art digital photos and comprehensive, up-to-date data on North American birds. . . . Comparable guides include Ted Floyd's Smithsonian Field Guide to the Birds of North America and Edward Brinkley's National Wildlife Federation (NWF) Field Guide to Birds of North America. All three titles are excellent. However, the Sterry-Small guide's larger photos aid identification and highlight variable plumage. Corner insets identify groups of birds for easier browsing. Birders will love the portability, excellent photography, habitat, and conservation information. -- Sally Bickley, Library Journal



This pair of photographic guides provides superb quality photographic images which are well up to the best of modern standards. If your American photo-guides are a few years old, now is the time to update them. The text is surprisingly detailed and concisely covers all plumages, as well as 'Status and Habitat,' 'Voice,' and 'Observation tips,' and the distribution maps are detailed and clear. These are now the best photographic guides for North America and exceptional value-for-money too. -- Steve Gantlett, Birding World



Flat-out gorgeous. We see the birds standing, swimming and in flight. There's the usual field buide-style information--maps of their range, what they sound like, etc.--but this book seems to make things uniquely clear. -- Sandy Bauers, Philadelphia Inquirer



Birds of Eastern North America: A Photographic Guide and Birds of Western North America: A Photographic Guide should be a welcome addition to the libraries of serious birders as well as those who enjoy birdwatching only from their own backyard feeders. . . . I recommend both books. -- Brad Sylvester, Manchester Bird Watching Examiner



The photos in these books are large, crisp and clear. . . . They are durable field guides that easily slip into a backpack or even a large pocket in an overcoat, but their pictures are good enough to be a coffee table book. . . . Of all the various field guides I have ever seen, these . . . are by far the best. -- James Swan, ESPNOutdoors.com



Outstanding. . . . The photos are of such superb detail you expect them to fly off the pages. -- Bill Cochran, Roanoke Times



Stunning. This was the first word that came to mind upon cracking open these new guides. . . . The photography alone is worth owning both Eastern and Western editions. Even so, the accompanying text is fantastic too. -- Eddie Callaway, Birdfreak.com



The guides are, in a word, gorgeous--the photos are crisp (the latest digital technology captures rich detail) and the page layout is superb. -- Fannie Peczenik, Pittsburgh Bird Watching Examiner



Paul Sterry and Brian Small have created books with large, superior photos placed on pages designed to be lively and interesting. The text accompanying each species is three or four times as long as what you find in most ID books. It's pertinent and sharply written. -- Jim Williams, Minneapolis Star Tribune



I was immediately captivated by the stunning photographs. . . . This one's a keeper. -- George Smith, Down East.com



[Birds of Eastern North America] uses 1,118 exceptional color photographs to set it apart from the many other field guides in book stores. And somehow the designer managed to increase the image size so that every species is clearly and vibrantly depicted. Many of the smaller species appear at almost life size. This guide should appeal to beginning and experienced birders alike. -- Scott Shalaway, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



The Sterry-Small guides will no doubt set new benchmarks for photo quality and precise reproduction. Inset photos cover seasonal and gender variations in plumage, picture birds in flight or show groups of birds for easier identification. Sterry's well-organized descriptions offer bird-spotting tips and information on habitat, feeding styles and conservation status. Range maps compile the latest data from the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. -- Valerie Sudol, New Jersey Newsroom



A lot of clever thought went into the design of this new birding guide, and you'll find it easy to use plus especially helpful and simply jam-packed with lots of useful information. -- James Drake, Southern Maryland Newspapers



A fine pair of guides for North America. . . . Small's photos are big, bright, and tack-sharp. . . . Sterry's generous accounts supplement the accompanying photographs well. . . worthwhile acquisitions for field guide consumers and completists alike. -- Mike Bergin, 10,000 Birds



Informative and accessible text, up-to-date maps, and stunning color photographs. Images have been carefully selected to convey both the sheer beauty and the key identification features of each bird, and many of the photos are larger than those found in most other guides. -- OSNA Birds



I never used to be very keen on photographic field guides for birds until I perused these two volumes. . . . An excellent volume set for the North American birder, complete with lavish photos larger than those seen in other field guides, useful, up-to-date range maps and an easy-to-use format. -- David Bird, Montreal Gazette



The Sterry/Small guides are an innovative, useful addition to the arsenal of tools available to help us improve our birding skills. These outstanding guides deserve a place in your pocket, bookshelf, nightstand and bathroom. -- Wayne Mones, Audubon Magazine



The Sterry and Small field guide is good in that the photographs, which are outstanding, are quite large for a book small enough to fit into a big pocket. Colored bars with family names across the top of each page make it quick and easy to locate the warblers, wrens, etc. Range maps include all of North America, not just the eastern region. Status, habitat and observation tips are given for each species. -- Marcia Davis, Knoxville News Sentinel



Deserve a perch in your birding library. Birds of Western North America and its companion guide Birds of Eastern North America are photographic field guides, with clear, well-defined full-color photos for ease of identification. -- David Buchanan, Grand Junctions Sentinel



Sterry and Small have produced what I believe is the finest photographic field guide of eastern birds. . . . The photographs in this guide are crisp, informative and, in many cases, stunning. -- Herb Wilson, Portland Press Herald



Compact and modestly priced, Birds of Eastern North America is a beautiful field guide (in fact, one of the best I've seen) and the top-notch photos are accompanied by oodles of informative facts and figures about the species illustrated. -- Ron Tott, The Travel Editor



Fabulous photographic field guides. . . . Birds of Eastern North America: A Photographic Guide, and its companion piece Birds of Western North America, are a tremendous addition to any library of bird identification literature. . . . Even those accustomed to an artist's illustration rather than photography to highlight identification features will find themselves reaching for these volumes time after time to confirm a field sighting of a bird in its natural habitat. -- Birding Business



Many of the more recent field guides to birds are illustrated with high-quality photographs. The present offerings, produced by well-respected authors/photographers Sterry and Small, are additional fine examples. . . . They are . . . beautiful, exceptionally well-produced volumes that will be found in most libraries with comprehensive ornithological holdings and on the shelves of many birders. -- Choice



I highly recommend these books as field guides for intermediate birders . . . and as home study guides for beginners and armchair naturalists. Of course every avid birders will want these guides as well. -- Dan Kunkle, Wildlife Activist



These indispensable guides will quickly become the preferred photographic guides for new and experienced birders alike. The clear layout will help novices easily identify the birds they see, while the superb photographs will help seasoned birders confirm identifications. -- Adventure Sports Outdoors



With these volumes, we've at last found photographic guides that are as easy to identify birds from as I.D. books that feature paintings. . . . [These] photographic guides aren't pocket size, but they're small enough that we'll carry them in the car and, with binoculars, in a pack on a serious birding outing. We expect to spend some enjoyable winter evenings browsing through them, enjoying the superb photos, and readable text, looking up old friends and preparing to meet new ones. -- Bob and Linda Steiner, The Derrick



The most impressive feature of this field guide is the photography. Each species account contains one to several photographs: most are large and sharp and clearly illustrate useful details for identification. . . . It would make a nice addition to any collection of bird guides, if nothing else for the beautiful photographs. -- Amber N. Wiewel, Iowa Bird Life



These guides are certainly worthy as a secondary field guide and photographic reference. No question, they are certainly the best photographic guides currently available. -- Alan Knue, South Dakota Bird Notes



Sterry and Small have created the best photograph based field guides I have seen for North American birds. -- Michael J. Andersen, Quarterly Review of Biology



[T]hese [two] books do have truly wonderful photographs and written descriptions that are useful in identifying and differentiating species. The guides could be especially useful to the casual birder. If you consider the cost of the paperback edition, they are an attractive, affordable addition to one's library. -- Clayton M. White, Western North American Naturalist



With the proliferation of options, choosing a good field guide is increasingly a question of personal preference. Most of my casual birder friends prefer photographic guides; most keen birders seem to prefer traditional guides with paintings. I would recommend this book for novice birders and for those wanting to supplement a more traditional guide. -- Mark Gawn, Canadian Field-Naturalist



The large, well-composed and well-edited photographs, combined with good text and range maps, may very well place these as the top photographic guides for North America. -- Nathan Hentze, Discovery



Exceptionally well done. Double-page layouts of text and maps on the left and digitally enhanced photos of the matching birds on the right make these guides easy to use in the field. -- John Riutta, Bird Watcher's Digest

About the Author

Paul Sterry is a highly regarded and best-selling wildlife author and photographer. He is the author or coauthor of more than 50 books, including the "HarperCollins Complete North American Wildlife" and the "Collins Complete British Birds". Brian E. Small is a leading nature photographer and author, and the photo editor of "Birding" magazine. He has been the principal photographer for many photographic field guides, including "The Smithsonian Field Guide to the Birds of North America" (HarperCollins) and "Birds of North America" (Houghton Mifflin).

Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Princeton University Press; 1 edition (September 21, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 069113426X
• ISBN-13: 978-0691134260
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #690,093 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fabulous photographs, but limited field guide, October 4, 2009

By 

David P. Tietjen "Aficionado of bird books" (Huntsville, AL) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Birds of Eastern North America: A Photographic Guide (Princeton Field Guides) (Paperback)

These two new books from Princeton (I include the companion Western North America guide simultaneously released) represent the latest of the recent offerings for North American bird guides utilizing photographs to illustrate the birds, joining the National Wildlife Federation guide from 2007 and the Smithsonian guide from 2008. Bird field guides in general are based on either an artist's representations of the birds or photographs, with pros and cons for each, and the debate over which is superior goes on and on - I will not elaborate here, but I will describe some specifics for each of the three different books and thus compose a review applicable to all of them.

This new Princeton guide is the only one which divides the continent into East and West in separate volumes; both NWF and Smithsonian cover both coasts in one book, and thus are thicker (over 500 pages each) and correspondingly quite heavy. This decision of the authors/editors and publisher is another of the big bird guide debates, and again I will not try to argue which is better, but certainly there is a great deal of duplication of entries (birds found across the entire continent or right in the middle) in a 2-volume set, so simply adding the pages or weight together isn't really a fair comparison. A more appropriate distinction involves examination of the visual layout possible in each approach. Here the need for full NA coverage in the Smithsonian and NWF guides forces a compact presentation, with two or sometimes three bird entries including brief text and small photographs all on the same page, while the fewer species to be covered in the half-continental approach allows the Princeton guide to print much larger photographs on the right-hand page with text (and frequently additional small photos) on the left, again in two or three species groups. The result for the Princeton guide is far more "reader-friendly" in terms of typeface, range map interpretation, and most notably, in the appearance of the birds themselves - each species shown truly jumps off the page in a visual sense. No doubt this impact is amplified by the editing of the photographs (which must have been accomplished via computer assistance along the lines of the Kaufman Focus guide) with the result that frequently the bird images overlap into the adjacent photo's background. Both of the other photographic guides use traditional images which are cropped to fit, with the Smithsonian book including some inset photos.

The text for the Princeton guides is much more extensive as would be expected for the space available. Bullet points are used in the Smithsonian guide, and identification features are placed either on each photograph (NWF guide) or directly alongside each photograph (Smithsonian) in order to maximize room for the photos, but text description of other information is by necessity limited in these two guides. Princeton includes the usual description of appearance in sentence form, with sections for voice, habitat, and behavior, but also adds a unique section for each bird called "Observation Tips" where a blurb describes how to separate similar species or in what circumstances a bird is best found. This is a great idea, but is often simply too general to be very useful.

The core of these books, of course, are the photographs themselves. As mentioned above from the standpoint of photographic size and clarity, the Princeton guide is much the superior work. I go to a photographic guide in order to see an image of a real bird, but real birds tend to vary quite a bit in appearance, so therefore I want to see as many examples as I can find - hence my library contains all three of these guides, and the best guide would have multiple photos of each bird. I also want these collections of photographs to be as inclusive as possible; ideally the entire American Birding Association checklist will be depicted in at least some form of image. None of these guides is perfect in these regards, and probably no portable volume ever could be. But along these lines the biggest fault I find in the Princeton guide is the significant absence of quite a few species which I would assume any comprehensive NA guide would include. In the Princeton guide's Introduction, under a heading of The Choice of Species, the authors state that "All our resident species are included here, as well as seasonal visitors to the region ...". This is most certainly not accurate in my view, and I will provide a few examples. Pelagic birders will be disappointed to find only 8 shearwaters in the combined Princeton volumes and exactly zero gadfly petrels, versus 11 shearwaters and 8 petrels in the NWF guide and 10 shearwaters and 6 petrels in the Smithsonian. If the Princeton guide were your only source, you would not know that tropicbirds even existed. Only by arguing that "the region" does not include oceanic waters less than 200 miles offshore can one agree with not choosing more of these birds for inclusion in a guide. Vagrants which are predictable visitors such as White-eared Hummingbird or rather frequent arrivals such as Curlew Sandpiper are not in the Princeton guide (but are in both of the others); rarities which an observant birder will have a chance to see in our region but are not in the Princeton offering include Eared Quetzal and White-collared Seedeater (again both are in the other guides). A publication as recent as the Princeton guide would be expected to portray Common Mynah now that the ABA has placed it on its checklist as being resident in Florida, but it is not there, as it is in last year's Smithsonian guide. Finally, Gray Hawk is a summer resident of southern Arizona, and Tropical Parula is a year-round resident of southern Texas (they are scarce and local, but still resident), yet these birds are not found in the Princeton guide, as they are in the others. In my mind these omissions are indicative of considerably less than rigorous authorship, especially when the stated aim of the book was to be all-inclusive.

In the final analysis the Princeton guide is superb for the photographs it includes, but rates only four stars due to the ones it does not include. Both of the other guides would also rate four stars due to the required compression of their imagery, with extra marks for the scope of their coverage. In my mind all have their greatest value in providing a view of the bird in the most realistic fashion possible for preliminary study prior to venturing out to the field, and in confirming identifications after the fact. I will continue to use an art-based book for my principal field guide (and for my secondary one as well), but will now use the Princeton guide as a third-level reference.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Princton scores., February 3, 2010

By 

John M. Good - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Birds of Eastern North America: A Photographic Guide (Princeton Field Guides) (Paperback)

This is certainly the best photo guide I have seen; the pictures are crisp and well-chosen. I have no misgivings about recommending is for a birder's library. But as a book to carry into the field, it has drawbacks. For example, there is no quick index (2 pager); you must plow through the dense, full index in fine print, useless in the field. The reader may have some trouble with diagnostic marks on the birds; I did, Nevertheless, I find myself using it frequently at home.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Book Review, August 2, 2010

By 

Laura L. Simms (Baltimore, MD United States) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Birds of Eastern North America: A Photographic Guide (Princeton Field Guides) (Paperback)

Excellent book - this is just what we were looking for! This book has excellent photos of both mature and juvenile birds as well as male and female. We have been able to identify several birds already that we were not familiar with.