The Best Bird Book Going!

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Is This the Best Bird Book Going?

If you are like me - an avid nature lover - then a bird book is a very important part of your travelling gear. At home, we have four big bird books, but being ever mindful of weight, plus the fact you need the book always in the van or backpack for that unexpected sighting, the purchase of a good sturdy, but not too heavy, field guide is a necessity.

We looked through four books - all just bigger than A5 in size (but all quite thick) and selected this one - The Field Guide to Birds of Australia. That doesn't mean the others aren't good - it was an extremely hard decision - they all had good points, plus as it was at Lakes Entrance, we had no idea if the store stocked all possibilities. Why did Pizzey and Knight win? The meticulous quality and true to life colours of the illustrations - the exhaustive descriptions of not only the mature, but also the juvenile birds in various stages of development - the excellent habitat and voice detail.

From emus to sea birds to parrots to honeyeaters to nocturnal visitors and finches - if you get a good glimpse, you will be able to identify your visitor.

This Field Guide was first published in 1997 and reprinted three times in quick succession. This edition was originally issued in 1999 and reprinted in 2000 (when we got it). Around the $45.00 mark it is an investment in many hours of pleasure - written by bird lovers for bird watchers. Worth every cent!!!

Chrissy

UPDATE 10/5/02

Dear Bob & Chrissy:

Noticed that you have chosen just one of the four field guides to promote as "the best". This is rather disappointing in that the guides are all different in their approach, and many readers would,
as shown by the good sales of all these books, prefer one of the others- and very many birdwatchers, like yourselves, eventually obtain all of the guides. Ours has been extremely popular (printed 4 times in 18 months, showing that its features (the nests and eggs, the identifying notes among the illustrations, the greater number of illustrations, the greater number of birds, the greater amount of text), etc, have made it a popular choice. But it's all a matter of PERSONAL preference. So perhaps you would be doing a greater service for A'vanners to show all four, or feature one at a time, each for a few months, and let readers decide for themselves, rather than impose your own personal preference, which seems rather along the lines of "we know what is best for you...".

Otherwise, congratulations on an informative and useful site. It's taken me many hours to explore. We have caravanned and camped around Australia seeking birds and other subjects since the 1960's, when you could camp at places like Mitchell Falls in the Kimberly's for a week and see no-one else, unlike the crowd scene of today. However, as you probably well know, almost any quiet bush camp can be terrific for birds at the right time of year...doesn't need to be a tourist site,
and it is such places that are accessible with the compact A'van.

We have tried almost way of camping over the years... van with small kids aboard, rough camping, and recently, an A'van Cruiser.

Hope you might be able to present to your readers a wider range of bird guides at some future time, so that they may be aware of the choice available to them.

Best wishes,

Michael Morcombe