Hawaii's Fishes : A Guide for Snorkelers, Divers, and Aquarists (Paperback)

by John P. Hoover (Author)

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.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 181 pages
• Publisher: Mutual Publishing; Second Edition edition (June 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1566470013
• ISBN-13: 978-1566470018
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #147,764 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

  #11 in	Books > Outdoors & Nature > Field Guides > Fish
  #31 in	Books > History > United States > State & Local > Hawaii
  #36 in	Books > Science > Biological Sciences > Zoology > Ichthyology

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

30 of 30 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 (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)

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.

9 of 9 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)

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.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great Photos, April 9, 2003

By	Robert S. Clark - See all my reviews

The author did an outstanding job compiling the many varieties of reef animals present on Hawaii's reefs and including them in one book. This book has it all if you want to get familar with what you'll most likely run into while diving or snorkeling while in the islands, but one drawback is the author's lack of detail in listing and describing the sites in the first part of the book where you're most likely to see such animals. I specifically wanted to know where to find them and at what depths. Using this book and a good dive or snorkeling guide like the O`ahu Snorkelers and Shore Divers Guide by Francisco B. de Carvalho would make anyone's hunt for photographic opportunities a simple task.