[.ca] A Guide to the Birds of Costa Rica (ISBN 0801496004)

The book of my dream!:
Like all the readers before me, I found this book unbelievably complete and thorough, compeling and mesmerizing. The color llustrations are beautifull. The text his precise and informative, from an overview of each bird family to description, habits, voice, nest, status and range of each bird. An absolute must-have for any bird- or Costa Rica lovers! A hundred times the informations in the Birds of North America... (which I still really really like!) Like the Quetzal calls: "very good, very good..."! The book is a bit heavy and I agree you should remove the central plates and only bring the illustrations on your field trip.

Book I Refer to the Most:
I have lived on the Pacific of Costa Rica for 5 years and find myself constantly referring to this book - one that was recommended to me by virtually every person I spoke to who knew I was relocating to Costa Rica. For other fans of this book, you may be interested to know that one of the authors, Alexander Skutch, recently passed away at the age of 99. He was a long-time resident of Costa Rica and long admired in ornithological circles. A memorial service was held for Mr. Skutch on May 20th - his 100th birthday - at the Tropical Science Center in Perez Zeledon, in the Southern Zone of Costa Rica. Please refer to an article in The Tico Times, May 14, 2004 edition.

One of the Best:
This book along with the essay collection "Costa Rica : The Last Country the Gods Made" should be owned by anyone who loves Costa Rica, even if they think they despise nature studies as dry and limited. This book's spirit is undeniable.

Classic and Useful:
It is hard to add much to the reviews provided by readers. The book is a superb guide to the birds of Costa Rica. It is a bit heavy and many guides cut the text out and bind the pictures into something a bit lighter for the field.

Birds of Costa Rica - a must-have:
This book is a "must" for Costa Rican birders - at least until the reviews are in on the new "Helm Guide" by Richard Garrigues due out in June 2007. That said, there are a few age-related drawbacks to Skutch's tome that should be borne in mind. Range information is quite out-of-date. For example, there is no mention of the Sandwich Tern colony that exists off Manuel Antonio National Park. Melodious Blackbird is treated as extremely rare, whereas it is now quite common. Maps included in the book are also quite antiquated. The user should obtain a separate highway map of Costa Rica. There are no species range maps, and the range descriptions given are a bit difficult to get used to. (Range maps for mountainous countries are difficult anyway, since range is often as much about elevation as it is about latitude). DO NOT cut out the plates and ignore the text! The range information in the text is essential to identifying many species. Moreover, it tends to be more accurate than the cursory range information included with the plates. The illustrations are generally very good, but not up to modern standards. In particular, pay attention to the WRITTEN descriptions of the birds, which are quite accurate. This is especially important when considering the SIZE of the bird, since the plates are NOT drawn "to scale" and birds illustrated as being the same size might not be so in real life. These are small quibbles, however. This book is generally very good to excellent. If you are a birder, you need this book.