Subject: [Tweeters] Crossed Guide
Date: Feb 27 04:21:33 2011
From: Steven Mlodinow - sgmlod at aol.com


Greetings All


Though I have not really put enough time to fully analyze this guide, I can say I don't like it.




The images are dim, the colors incredibly muted in some species (see Myiarchus flycatchers, for which the photos are nearly worthless), while very bright for others (mainly large pale birds, such as egrets). The Poor-will shot might as well be a smudge on the paper. Sometimes, there are confusingly bright and dull images on same page.


This need not have been. Look at the guide recently put out by Small and ?? (Sorry, I have virtually none of my books handy). That guide shows several images for most species, substantially more than most photo guides, and the photos are bright and sharp, showing the needed field marks.


I was concerned that, though looking FABULOUS on my computer screen, that the photos (with many small images) in Crossley's book would not show well in a printed guide. I think that be the case.


As for habitat, he has Marsh Wren and Sedge Wren in each other's habitat.


His empid discussion is confusing, misleading, or sometimes wrong... inferior to either NGS or Sibley. If the Canada Goose he portrays is a Lesser, it is of the small Anchorage race, which is dark breasted, not the typical white breasted birds of the Great Plains (eg, Colorado) or slightly dingy on average Lessers of eastern WA. One of his in-flight "Cackling Geese" is a maxima Canada.


Though Crossley says nearly all plumages for all birds are included, and he may be right there, most are not labelled and many are too small to be certain of.




His text is more readable, something to be highly commended, but somehow, it still doesn't work. He either has conflicting/wrong/ambiguous information (see Empids), or he just doesn't say anything new. But at least he doesn't waste 1/2 of his text talking about non-identification topics, as does Sibley.


This is just a start, but it took only 20 minutes to find much that I found inaccurate or unappealing. This is a very different experience from my first glance at Sibley (which has its imperfections, as all guides will) or the Small book (again, not perfect, but very nice).


Cheers
Steve Mlodinow (I really haven't turned into a codger!!!)