Customer Reviews

Stokes Beginner's Guide to Shorebirds

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

 

 

Don and Lillian Stokes have taken one of the most difficult-to-identify groups of birds and made the task of differentiating them exponentially easier. Birders of all levels will appreciate this user-friendly, pocket sized book. Stokes Beginner's Guide To Shorebirds is a visually stunning book packed with spectacular photos of all the important shorebird plumages. Characteristic of all of Stokes books, the presentation is logical, clear, and straightforward, with information covering all North American breeding shorebirds.

The easy-to-use color tab system, which groups shorebirds by size and bill length, makes it simple to look up and identify a shorebird. The learning pages with photographic comparison of similar species, helpful comparative silhouettes, and revolutionary method of identification by shape, all will give birders a firm grasp of learning shorebirds.

In addition, the amount of information is impressive, including superb migration maps that show where and when each species can be expected during spring and fall migrations. No previous book has ever graphically shown these birds' migration paths; instead, until now the only way to get this information would have been to wade through countless publications and laboriously extract the relevant details. The Stokes Beginner's Guide to Shorebirds shows me, at a glance, which shorebirds pass through my area and when I should see them.

Beginners will now have an excellent tool to help them begin to master this exciting group of birds. Intermediate and advanced birders will use the beautiful photos of all important plumages, extensive information, and innovative maps to add to their knowledge of shorebirds. Anyone with even a passing interest in shorebirds will want to own this impressive book.

This is an excellent shorebird guide -- and not just for beginners. I bought this guide for a specific purpose: I lead tours in a wetland refuge and wanted an easy-to-carry guide I could use to show pictures of birds to people on the tour. This book fits my needs perfectly, but many others should find it useful. It is small and easy to carry. The book uses photo illustrations: I believe photos are better than paintings for depicting shorebirds since silhouettes are so important for shorebird identification and it is hard to get the proportions exactly right in a painting. The photos in this book are excellent. Shorebirds can vary greatly in appearance because of plumage variations. This book has multiple photos of most species and does a good job of depicting the plumage variation. This book is less comprehensive than some larger guides, but since it is designed as a beginner's guide, it wouldn't make sense for it to be too long and complicated. An excellent little book.

Prior to reading this book, I gave up on shorebird identification. This book makes it very easy for a beginner like me to ID shorebirds. I love the easy way you identify birds by size and then picture. I'm finding it is now fun to try to ID the shorbs!

This is an outstanding field guide for shorebirds and it is not just for beginners. I have been birding for more than 20 years but I have had limited experiences with shorebirds and I found this small book comprehensive and organized in such a way that it has now become the only book I carry when I'm watching shorebirds.

I'd actually rate this 41/2 stars, but that choice wasn't available. It's organization is based on a neat color tabbed guide that breaks the birds down by body size and further refines this by bill size. This rapidly narrows choices and speeds comparitive evaluations. The migration maps, both spring and fall, though general in their timing, further help narrow selection. I love this little book! It's lightweight, thin design makes it easy to carry into the field, yet it is wonderfully illustrated with summer, winter and juvenile characterists depicted for nearly every bird. It's only shortcoming - and this would perhaps alter it's small, light, handy character - would be insufficient pictures of the birds in flight.

I purchased this book as a companion to Shorebirds of North America by Dennis Paulson and use the Paulson book as a reference when Stokes leaves me still wondering. The Paulson book, however, stays in the car, both because the Stokes book is that good and because I don't want the more extansive pictures and more elaborate descriptions in the Paulson book getting wet, dirty or ruined.

I teach beginning bird classes for our local Audubon chapter. When I saw this book I thought this would be so useful for an upcoming class. Good price. Good information. I can't wait to use in a classroom and in a field setting.

Good little pocket reference for shore bird watching fits in a pocket or backpack easily quite comprehensive who knew there were so many different shore birds?! Another good deal with great pack and super fast ship too as usual from Amazon very pleased.

This book is very helpful for a quide in identifiying shorebirds but still can't figure out what the shorebird with a dark head, light underneath, and a straight bill is.