Customer Reviews

A Field Guide to Moths of Eastern North America (Special Publication / Virginia Museum of Natural History)

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

 

 

Excellent source guide to moths of the Eastern United States. The photos in this edition lack clarity and need to be printed better. The author is superb. He is the authority in his field. All that is lacking is quality printing of the material.

The reference text is very complete and detailed. However, when I found that most of the photo plates were black and white, I groaned. What I imagined I'd be receiving was a field guide with a good photo with each entry. As it is you have to flip back and forth from text to plate. A book with photo plates is really "old school" these days.

This is the same classic Moths that Peterson Guides put out, only it's in the format of the Robert Anthony style guides that came out in the late '80s. White and a single color with a photo on the front. Inside, it's the same wonderfully complete Charles Covell book, un-updated as far as i can tell, but not numbered like the true Peterson Guides.

So, if you're looking for the contents of the book and to identify moths, this is the CHEAPest way to get a copy - and thank the Virginia Museum of Nat. History for working to get the reprint rights. If you are looking for a collector's version, it fills slot 30 better than the Easton Press leather edition because it looks like a Peterson Guide.

I finally found the original after years of searching, just about a month before this edition came out :(
I have used it for a year and find it very helpful. I have learned two things that help a lot:
1) Although the photo plates leave something to be desired, they get you most of the way to identification, and there are a number of websites you can use for confirmation;
2) It does not include recent invaders like the Large Underwing, and some of the ranges may have changed since the original text wa swritten.

Literally, within the first 2 minutes I owned the book I realized that I had incorrectly identified a tiny arctiidae in my collection as a noctuidae. (And this is not the only moth field guide I own). This indispensable and some-what famous field guide is extremely accurate and easy to use. I would have given it 5 stars, but the black and white plates it contains make identification slightly more difficult. The arrows on the plates pointing to distinct features are quite helpful. A HUGE number of moth species are included in this field guide, including ones that other moth books do not include due to their small size or drab coloring. The suggested moth-related classroom projects are a neat addition. Covell's Moths of Eastern North America is a Must-Have!