Birds of Costa Rica (Helm Field Guides)

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I did note that the guides who accompany you on various jungle walks all had well thumbed copies of this book so must be the best one out there! Either way I had it does get established and helps fill in that garden, and even if it moves into the lawn, that wouldn't be so bad. The only advantage of this is that when you see these species in the field you’ll be bowled over as indeed in reality they are far more dazzling. Keeping up with taxonomic thinking in the neotropics is a nightmare, and compared to other recent field guides in the region this one is very conservative in its approach. The guide does not cover most pelagics - Gulls particularly are omitted - but near-shore species such as Brown Pelican and Magnificent Frigatebird are included.

While not a page turner, it is filled with excellent information on all things natural in the tropics. Wish I had bought this before I took the trip to Costa Rica, rather than the much-inferior one i unwisely bought. It is certainly the best book to use for any bird tours to Costa Rica, compact and generally accurate and I recommend it to all of our clients.

This is exactly the focus of The Birds of Costa Rica – to assist with identification in the field – and the book succeeds admirably.

For the nature lover fortunate enough to vacation in Costa Rica—and for all lovers of beautiful birds—comes this up-to-date, comprehensive field guide to the native and migrant birds to be found in that country. Few people get to see these species but it would have been good to show them, even if just to raise awareness of them with the authorities. I think that most birders will appreciate this “pioneering” approach, along with the common name suggestions for their new species.As systematics marches ever (sometimes frustratingly) onwards, more field guides that demystify the authors’ decisions on species naming, and connect present names with those of the past and future would be welcome. It fits easily in my backpack, the illustrations are solid, and the distribution maps really help me if I’ve seen a highly uncommon bird, and I want to check to be sure it was what I think it was. Ecotourists, birders, and biologists come from around the world, drawn by the likelihood of seeing more than three or four hundred species of birds and other animals during even a short stay. These authors are “splitters” and have elevated a lot of what were previously considered “subspecies” to full species, that no major world lists recognize yet as such.

This updated second edition features 903 species in total, including 64 that are illustrated here for the first time. The text itself is concise and stripped down to the bare minimum, but there is enough there to aid identification where the illustrations were not in themselves sufficient. It features descriptions and illustrations of more than 820 resident and neotropical migrant species found in Costa Rica, all in a compact, portable, user-friendly design. Fifty-six of these species are placed in a "Rarities" section that includes accidentals, rarer pelagics, and species that have not been reported in more than twenty years. It seems obvious that the most important component of a book dedicated to enabling observers to identify a bird, is the accuracy of the illustrations.

Range maps and nomenclature have been updated for this edition, which also has a new user-friendly organizational scheme and alphabetical quick-find indexes of groups and families on the inside back cover. Please note that audiobooks and ebooks purchased from this site must be accessed on the Princeton University Press app. The taxonomy in this book follows the IOC except for oceanic species, where Steve Howell has adopted the classification that he used in his recent photo guide, Oceanic Birds of the World.

Further space is saved by not covering 27 pelagic seabirds that you are very unlikely to see anyway. The back of the book includes a checklist for the birds of Costa Rica, but most guides will provide those for the members of their birding group. Graced with bounteous natural beauty, a stable democratic government, and friendly citizens, Costa Rica has become a popular destination for travelers from all over the world.Our friend liked the book because he felt the colouration of the pictured birds was more accurate than those in the other book. The authors have used all of that knowledge to produce an excellent, lightweight guide that will undoubtedly become the go-to guide for visitors to this wonderful country. This is followed by a brief but illuminating section describing the country’s biogeography and how its physical geography influences local climate to create the general patterns where birds are found. The detailed full-color illustrations show identifying features--including plumage differences among males, females, and juveniles--and views of birds in flight wherever pertinent. Like most field guides, Birds of Costa Rica (2023) opens with a section detailing how to use the book.