A Guide to the Birds of Colombia (Paperback)

by Steven L. Hilty (Author), William L. Brown (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
A new standard has been set for South American field guides by this book. Hilty and Brown have done an extraordinary job compiling comprehensive information on the approximately 1,700 bird species found in Colombia. -- Review

Review
A new standard has been set for South American field guides by this book. Hilty and Brown have done an extraordinary job compiling comprehensive information on the approximately 1,700 bird species found in Colombia.
(The Quarterly Review of Biology )

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Product Details

• Paperback: 996 pages
• Publisher: Princeton University Press (August 1, 1986)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 069108372X
• ISBN-13: 978-0691083728
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 1.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #166,769 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best for Neotropical South American birds, October 1, 1999

By A Customer

This is currently the best field guide for the Amazon Basin, and anywhere in Colombia. As the worlds #1 bird nation, this bird guide gives you a good insight into the birds of tropical South America, with national maps and still-adequate recomendations of where to see birds. The guide includes illustrations of most of the birds of Ecuador, Peru, and Brazil, all of which lack comprehensive bird guides. Venezuela has a guide, but not as detailed as this one for the Amazon basin. You can't go wrong with this if visiting Neotropical South America in search of birds.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A MUST for Amazon birders., February 5, 1999

By	[e-mail] (Eagle River, Wisconsin) - See all my reviews

We recently toured the peruvian Amazon rainforest and this book proved invaluable to bird sightings and classifications. We are just casual birders, but found the easy to follow format and concise explanations with exquisite plates very useful. Don't leave home for the South American rainforest without it!

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Made birding in Amazonia easy, September 27, 2000

By	JW (Wageningen Netherlands) - See all my reviews

Since no definitive bird guide is available for the Amazon region and Brazil in general, I was forced to choose between this guide and the Birds of Venezuela. I ended up with Hilty and Brown's book by sheer coincidence, and I was not at all disappointed. The text and information is superb throughout, and I was able to identify several species on habitat description alone. For example, the authors clearly describe the preference of many taxa for varzea (seasonally flooded) or terra firme forests, which made a fleeting glimpse more of a certainty, and the range descriptions were invaluable. If I have only one very minor criticism, it is that I have never found plates in black and white particularly helpful, and since several artists were employed, there were differences in visual interpretation in several groups (e.g. the Picidae). However, these are minor detractions from an outstanding volume.