Customer Reviews

Collins Bird Guide: The Most Complete Field Guide to the Birds of Britain and Europe

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book emerged onto a highly competitive market already burgeoning with numerous field guides covering the region, most by renowned authors and many having benefitted from improvement over several editions. Quite simply though, this book won instant recognition as the best field guide available for Europe - and perhaps a model for field guides everywhere. Its authors are well known experts in their field having spent many years studying and publishing on the birds of the region. However, the key to the guide's success is the fact that so much more useful information has been condensed into a guide which is much the same size as existing books. The book boasts excellent illustrations, succinct text and handy maps, all presented on a the same page. Small enough to fit into a pocket (about the same size as the National Geographic guide) and cheap, it is a must for anyone visiting Europe. As one reviewer has already pointed out, it is indispensable in Alaska too - not just for Palaearctic vagrants, but for regular shorebirds and some residents. Don't hesitate!

This book help me a lot during several bird trips on my first visit to Europe in 1999. I have travelled in several countries. Sometimes with very keen birders, other times alone. It would be impossible for me to be in the field in conditions to identify so many birds, without this valuable book. Excellent pictures. It's my new standard on international field guides.

Excellent book with comprehensive coverage and high quality plates. Book production quality is also high. My edition is small enough in hardback to be a true "Field Guide" although I understand that a new larger edition has been recently published, if plate quality is maintained this edition will be an excellent reference. If you have questions about this text go to amazon.co.uk and read some of the reviews there. This book recieved the British Trust for Ornithology seal of approval so anything an amateur like me might add is probably superfluous. Excellent reference, nice plates and informative and accurate text

I was very much looking forward to the paperback Collins Bird Guide, but unfortunately the pages are crowded, the print tiny and cramped, and the binding does not allow the book to open completely. While the Guide may be exhaustive and accurate, it is neither satisfactory as a field guide nor enjoyable to read at home. Were the text less verbose and even conversational, perhaps a larger font could have been used. I had hoped for something analogous to Sibley, "Field Guide to Birds of Western North America", which has a clear layout and a binding that opens properly.

My military service has given me the opportunity to travel around Europe for the past 15 years and this is the best bird guide I've purchased. The drawings are accurate, the text filled with interesting and helpful facts and, best of all, the range maps make for rapid (and accurate) field identifications. This book is a keeper.

Please note that all reviews prior to February 2010 concern the first edition. However, much of what has been said for that first edition holds for the new one as well. And if you live in North America, it makes more sense (economically), to get the Princeton version: Birds of Europe: (Second Edition) (Princeton Field Guides). That edition is not only cheaper, it also has a more suitable name. Its contents is exactly the same, despite the different name.

At any rate, the long awaited second edition of this excellent field guide is finally here. Improving on the world's best bird field guide is almost certainly a task that will disappoint a few. However, the authors and illustrators are to be commended for their achievement. Despite an addition of almost fifty pages, compared to the first edition, this is still a very field-worthy book. The text, range maps, and many illustrations have been throughly revised and updated. Particularly noteworthy are the many new owl illustrations, and the page of "Atlantic" pigeons. Many "new" species have been added due to splits from previous subspecies. Thus, many island races from the Canary Islands are now full species. Some taxonomic groups got a particular revision, such as the wheatears and the "Herring Gull complex". The treatment of the latter has been expanded from less than a double page to three full spreads. With Caspian Gull being fully illustrated in various plumages, for example. The taxonomic sequence got some changes in the first parts of the book, with geese and ducks now at the front. The same confusing fashion as in field guides of North America and many other areas of the world. There is actually no need for a field guide to follow the latest taxonomic insights. Rather, there needs to be a sequence that allows for quickly finding a group of birds. And that would be best served if the basic sequence were kept constant.

Unfortunately, non-native species got a rather worse coverage than in the first edition. Some were relegated to the back of the book such as the locally well established Wood Duck and Mandarin Duck. And even for the European native Ruddy Shelduck, the range presumably due to human releases is not shown on the map. Personally, I consider such omissions a lack of recognizing reality. The same problems, unfortunately, are found in such leading works as the Handbook of the Birds of the World, and likewise for the mammal equivalent.

A welcome change in the range maps is the use of more detailed regional maps for very localised species. Despite the time span of about ten years since the first edition, and the repeated postponement in the publication of this edition for about two years, it seems that there must have been a certain rush at the end. Thus, there are relatively many typos or other minor oversights. No big thing, but somewhat of a bother nevertheless. Hopefully, a large part will be corrected in subsequent printings.

Despite the various points I have criticized here, the book fully merits its five stars. It is just SO good! However, if you already own the first edition, and you use it mainly for local birding, you might want to just keep that edition.