Customer Reviews

Handbook of Tropical Aquarium Fishes Hb

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

 

 

I liked this book because i could look up pictures of many different fish. it has a lot of general information on livebearers and egg layers. what i did not like was: 1. The information about the fish and the photos were not together. After you read something about a fish you had to look it up seperatly to find a picture of it. there was information on some fish that were not pictured and pictures of some fish with no information on them. 2. there is no fish disease section 3. they talk about plants but there are no pictures of them 4, the filters they talk about are mostly outdated... no modern type filters like wet/dry or cannister, biotypes. if you want a cheap book that explains about breeding and to use it to identify fish this is a good one. The new hybrids are not included though and there is way too much information on the origination and patent of the ______ fish [i forgot, it was a section that i skipped] To be honest I just use the book for pictures only so I can look up the information elsewhere like on the internet.

Despite the fact that Dr. Axelrod wrote the text over 20-25 years ago, it is an excellent source for the various aquarium topics that all aquarium keepers eventually run across and need a reference book.

Information about various equipment and supplies are outdated but that information can be found in many different sources. If that is a major interest, this book will not help you. However, it does provide rich and detailed material about diseases, fish anatomy, fish behavior and requirements for aquariums.

This book delivers useful and detailed information that leaves nothing to the imagination.

Dr. Herbert Axelrod was the finest expert of tropical fish. I have kept fish for the past 38 years and have always relied on his books to guide me along the way, even to this day. If you keep fish, rely on this book.

This book is good but published in 1990. It replaced my old Exotic Aquarium Fish, Innis published 1954. Axelrod has beautiful pictures, information on tanks, feeding, cleaning, heaters, filters, etc. Much has changed in recent years and some equipment and care information needs modification. As a definitive guide the book is great when used with advice from the pet store. Be sure to find the fish expert if the pet store is a National Chain, or go to a special Aquarium shop or small local pet store that has Aquarium fish.

ETR
Denver

This was a present for my son-in-law. I had a copy from the 1970's and he is a newbie to aquariums. I love mine so I bought a copy for him.

There are many species in this hanbook and they are treated in an orderly way. For the species that are contained it is a really nice handbook.

But i lack many species. I was looking for some specific cichlids that was not mentioned in this handbook.

The handbook has many illustrations most of which are black and white. Quality of illustrations are OK, but no more than that.

To the price it is a good and comprehensive guidebook to the subject.

My daughter thinks that Axelrod is the most knowledgeable person regarding fish and aquariums and requested a couple of his books for Christmas. Some of his stuff is pretty old, but this was one of the newer ones (the older one has black and white pictures), so she was thrilled.

Book was bought for my grandaughter who was always referring to my 30 year old copy.
She mainly uses it for fish descriptions with which she is happy.

If you decide you must have this book, make sure you get the 4th edition! I bought a 3rd edition from 1983 and despite its NEW condition got none of the pages of color photos that others rave about. The 3rd edition is on low quality paper, with only B&W photos, many of which are too dark to be of use. Additionally, because this book (regardless of edition) is in fact a reprint of the original published in 1955, it does contain lots of dated information regarding equipment and various aquarium set-up and maintenance practices.

In my humble opinion....save your money despite the low prices for this huge book in good used condition and buy a more up to date book with full color illustrations and less "intellectual" language.