Hawaii's Fishes : A Guide for Snorkelers and Divers [Paperback]

John P. Hoover (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 2007

Underwater photographs and informative descriptions of over 240 species, including classification, evolution, and best locations to spot them.

Editorial Reviews

From Scientific American

This little book is bursting at the seams with good, solid information.... Some of the photos will leave you gasping in disbelief--surely no fish could be so vivid!

From The New Yorker

All in all, it's hard to imagine more useful information in such a small book, and useful to both residents and visitors alike.... The color printing is gorgeous. How Mutual Publishing can deliver this much color at the price is a mystery.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 181 pages
• Publisher: Mutual Publishing; 2nd edition. 3rd printing edition (September 1, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1566470013
• ISBN-13: 978-1566470018
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #216,383 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #22 in Books > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Biological Sciences > Zoology > Ichthyology
  • #90 in Books > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Biological Sciences > Animals > Fish & Sharks

More About the Author

Hi,

Thanks for stopping by. In a nutshell, I'm a retired librarian who majored in English and loves diving and photography. Combine those four and how can you not get fish books? How many fish books have I written? Perhaps too many, but it's rewarding and fun, so why not? For many years my wife Marcia and I lived in Honolulu. In 2007 we both retired to the village of Volcano, on the Island of Hawaii, where we live just 3 miles from one of the world's most active volcanoes. I still do a lot of diving and underwater photography. Oh, and hiking too. Visit my website at

http://hawaiisfishes.com

Or, even better, if you want to see what I'm up to these days, check out my Picasa galleries:

http://picasaweb.com/jphoover
http://picasaweb.com/jphoover2009

Aloha,

John

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

36 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Terrific book for identifying Hawaii's unique fishes., March 18, 2001

By 

Mary Whipple (New England) - See all my reviews
(COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 100 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Hawaii's Fishes : A Guide for Snorkelers and Divers (Paperback)

Most kama'ainas and regular visitors who love to snorkel or scuba dive in Hawaii have a shelf of not-quite-complete reference books to help them identify the variety of gorgeous, often unique, fishes they see in Hawaiian waters. Everyone is always trying to find The Book that will help them identify some mystery fish barely glimpsed from a distance and often never seen again. If I could have only one book to help me find that mystery fish, this would be the one. Filled with helpful information describing both the families and specific varieties of fish seen in Hawaiian waters, this book has the best collection of photographs of all the books I've found. Often taken in dramatic close-up, and very artistic in composition, the photographs are all of live fish taken in their natural environments.

This can be both a blessing and a (minor) curse for the snorkeler and scuba diver. Photos which were taken at 30', for example, tend to have a bluish cast, which can distort the color of the fish when they are seen in shallow water of four feet. In addition, a close-up of the head of a particular eel, for example, does not help the snorkeler enough when s/he sees that eel from above, and it's moving at high speed among the rocks twenty feet below. The book is terrific, my favorite reference book, in fact, but for the devoted snorkeler determined to identify every fish s/he sees, I'd recommend that the Guide to Hawaiian Reef Fishes by John E. Randall be consulted as backup.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Comprehensive, July 19, 2002

By 

Keith P. Sheridan (Medford, MA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hawaii's Fishes : A Guide for Snorkelers and Divers (Paperback)

I am in complete agreement with Mary Whipple's review of this book, I looked very hard and could not find a more comprehensive book than this. I spent the last six weeks on the island of Maui, diving and snorkelling, I did not see one fish that I could not identify through this book. It is simply the book you are looking for when you want to identify fish in Hawaiian waters. The same goes for the other book, on invertebrates, written by Hoover.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A good way to ID all those little fishies on the reef, April 17, 2007

By 

Darrell Heath (Little Rock, AR USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hawaii's Fishes : A Guide for Snorkelers and Divers (Paperback)

I recently went to Hawaii and decided to do some snorkeling for the first time in my life. What a blast!! The variety and colors of fishes and corals are truly stunning and if your are like me you may not be satisfied with just seeing all the pretty colors, you may in fact want to identify the things you are seeing. If thats the case then this book is hands down the most affordable and reliable guide you can purchase when planning that snorkeling vacation in Hawaii.

I found the photos and the text to be very well done and informative. Each family of fish is given a good life history account and species accounts are nice and succinct. There is also great info on where to dive and snorkel while you are in Hawaii and also the fish names are given in English, Latin and Hawaiian.

For a novice like me this book was a great find and it helped me immensely in making some sense of the great variety of fish life I found on the reef. A word of warning however: while its great to be able to identify the fish species you are seeing don't get too caught up in trying to ID everything you come across. For one thing its next to impossible without having a much more technical book than this one. Still this is a great little introductory level book for appreciating the diversity of fish life in Hawaiian waters. Sometimes it is just as rewarding to relax and enjoy the spectacle of the reef life itself without having to try and remember the color patterns on every little fish you encounter. So, purchase this book if you are heading to Hawaii and enjoy the truly stunning world of the coral reef.