| Raptors of Western North America: The Wheeler Guides | 
 enlarge | Author: Brian K. Wheeler
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Category: Book
List Price: $29.95
Buy New: $19.77
You Save: $10.18 (34%)
New (21) Used (5) from $16.00
Avg. Customer Rating:  7 reviews
Sales Rank: 402141
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 560
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2.5
Dimensions (in): 9 x 5.9 x 1.1
ISBN: 0691134774
Dewey Decimal Number: 598.90978
EAN: 9780691134772
ASIN: 0691134774
Publication Date: July 2, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Product Description
Raptors of Western North America--together with its companion volume, Raptors of Eastern North America--are the best and most thorough guides to North American hawks, eagles, and other raptors ever published. Abundantly illustrated with hundreds of full-color high-quality photographs, they are essential books for anyone seeking to identify these notoriously tricky-to-identify birds. The Wheeler Guides will help birders and biologists navigate the pitfalls of raptor identification, including raptors' often extreme variation by age and sex as well as the existence of numerous "confusion" species. The plumage section discusses more plumage variations--and in greater consistency, depth, and clarity--than any previously published guide. The text--informed by years of study and consultation with local, state, provincial, and regional experts--covers all aspects of raptor biology in an easy-to-read and consistent format. It provides the most up-to-date information available on status and distribution, taking into account the recent alteration of some species' ranges due to pesticide bans and introduction programs. The range maps--which include "city" plotting--are the most accurate and largest ever produced for North American raptors.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 2 more reviews...
Best of the West January 28, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This is the most comprehensive guide available. The species discussions include practically everything you need to know (molts, morphs, subspecies, habits, etc), and covers Western variants rarely covered in other works. The range maps by Economidy and Wheeler are the gold standard and will, it is to be hoped, encourage others to produce such extremely precise maps. It is a reference work, too large to fit in a pocket, but is indispensable. Keep this in your vehicle and Clark & Wheeler's Hawks of North America in your pocket, and you've got our western raptors covered.
Raptors November 5, 2007
The text is technical and takes some work to understand but the effort pays off. The pictures are beautiful and flesh out the text. A wonderful aid to getting closer to some amazing creatures.
the very best March 9, 2007
This guide is more like a textbook in its attention to detail, and I rate it the best raptor guide I have seen and read. The photos are great, showing various poses and the way the birds look as juveniles and as adults of both sexes, and the text covers all the traits, habitat, morphs, etc. to help I.D. and understand the birds.
Photos, photos, photos... February 28, 2007
This book is wonderfull. With dozens of photos for each bird, this REALLY helps an amateur identify a bird. The best in it's class!
Great book, but what's with PUP? February 6, 2004
10 out of 10 found this review helpful
Brian Wheeler has created what are likely to be THE standard guides to these taxa for the foreseeable future. Excellent photos, tremendous detail--a heroic effort with incredibly helpful results.
But what is wrong at Princeton UP? First they mess up Olsen's _Gulls_ to the point that the entire edition is pulped; and now Wheeler's text in both books is marred by what you would think would be embarrassing editorial errors. Wheeler's prose, for the most part serviceable, was obviously never read by an editor, and there are entire passages that make no sense (fortunately, they only rarely include identification matters). The very first page of the author's introduction has a shameful printing error, an entire half-line left blank.
This is a great book, I own it, I use it, I recommend it every chance I get; but the editorial and production slips make me wonder if Princeton has given up on its birding program--or whether it maybe ought to.
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