Review: Dunn, Jon & Kimball Garrett.1997. _Warblers (a Peterson
Field Guide)_. Houghton Mifflin, Boston.

I stopped by Powell's on my way back from Portland this afternoon
and picked up the much anticipated Peterson's Warbler guide.

In looking it over, I find a curious mix of really good stuff and
disappointing bits. It's really thick, considering it only covers
the warblers of North America and it could be argued that there is
too much information in this guide.

The book is split into two field guides. The first is a concise
illustrated identification guide taking up the first quarter of
the book. The last three quarters (500 pages) is devoted to
species accounts. At an average of 8.5 page per species
you can, perhaps, see what I mean by too much information.

The illustrations are plentiful and cover most of the subspecific
variations (4 types of Orange-crowned Warblers, 6 types of Yellow
Warbler, 3 types of Wilson's Warblers). The illustrations are
Peterson-like, all in the same pose and pointed in the same
direction. It's pretty obvious that there were 2 illustrators
(Thomas Schultz and Cindy House), which is not to say that one
is better than the other. The best illustration is the series of
undertail coverts (since this is generally the most easily seen
part of a warbler).

The species accounts include photographs and very well done range
maps (broken down to subspecies in many cases). The accounts are
broken down in the usual way by description, behavior, song and
similar species, but also include a reflection of the trend in
quantum birding entitled "taxonomic relationships" which connects,
where possible, each species to others by cladistic characters
including DNA-DNA hybridization.

The paperback version is available from Powell's at $20.00 and is,
I think, probably worth that price. The range maps, completeness
of treatment of North American species and discussion of
subspecies is superior to _Warblers of the Americas_ (Curson,
Quinn and Beadle, 1994) though (in a close call) I favor the
illustrations in Curson.

--
********************************* I am but mad north-north-west;
* Mike Patterson, Astoria, OR * when the wind is southerly,
* mpatters at orednet.org * I know a hawk from a handsaw.
http://www.pacifier.com/~mpatters -ws