Books : A Guide to the Birds and Mammals of Coastal Patagonia
List Price: $80.00Amazon.com's Price: $58.40 You Save: $21.60 (27%)as of 03/18/2010 10:01 EDT details
Availability: Usually ships in 1 to 3 weeks
This item ships for FREE with Super Saver Shipping.
Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 599.09827
EAN: 9780691058313
ISBN: 0691058318
Label: Princeton University Press
Manufacturer: Princeton University Press
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 231
Publication Date: November 09, 1998
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Studio: Princeton University Press
Browse for similar items by category: Click to Display
Editorial Review:
Product Description:
This is the first guidebook to the birds and mammals of the coastal region of Patagonia, a vast area at the southern tip of South America. This guide describes the 185 species of birds and 61 species of mammals known to inhabit the land and sea along two thousand miles of the Patagonian coast, from Pent/nsula Valdés to the Strait of Magellan.
With an area covering over half a million square miles, Patagonia is larger than Spain and Portugal combined. It is scarcely populated and much of its land is desert, swept year-round by winds from both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. The greatest abundance and diversity of wildlife occurs where the great dry steppe meets the South Atlantic along a spectacular shoreline of unspoiled beaches and lonely headlands. One of the last truly untouched regions on earth, Patagonia is home to unusual indigenous birds and mammals, including the guanaco, the mara, and the lesser rhea. Huge colonies of Magellanic penguins and sprawling rookeries of Southern Elephant Seals crowd the shore in isolated areas while the bays shelter large pods of Southern Right Whales, occasionally hundreds at a time. In the past decade Patagonia has become a destination for tourists. Today Punta Tombo, home of the world's largest continental penguin colony, receives as many visitors each year as the Galapagos Islands.
Written for both the casual observer and the experienced naturalist, this book contains information on identifying all the birds and mammals of the region, as well as details of the natural history of some of the more common species. Extensively illustrated by the author, this guide provides complete information on every species, including common names (English, Spanish, and scientific) and descriptions of behavior, status and habitat, range, and distinguishing characteristics. A range map is included for each species, and all but a few species are illustrated, many in full color. This is an essential guide for anyone who is planning a trip to Patagonia and for anyone who is intrigued by one of the most ecologically fascinating regions on our planet.
Average Rating: 
Rating:  -
The positive:
Outstanding illustrations done with love and care. This is in itself reason enough to buy the book and why I cannot bring myself to give this book a rating under four stars.
Good detail level for an amateur.
The negative:
The title is misleading. It should have been "A Guide to the birds and Mammals of *Argentinian* Coastal Patagonia"! The book correctly identifies Patagonia as being spread between Chile and Argentina, yet the species from coastal Chilean Patagonia ... Read More
Rating: -
This interesting book is a hybrid in several ways. Its hard covers and size renders it rather awkward as a field guide, but a nice addition to a personal bookshelf. Its dealing with both birds and mammals renders it roughly half interesting to pure ornithologists and to pure mammalogists. Its contents includes descriptions of birds and mammals--both terrestrial and marine--, their status, and ranges, all elements useful for bird- and whale-watchers, but it also provides insightful comments on habitat and ... Read More
Rating:  -
Highly recommended for anyone traveling to Patagonia. The drawings are exemplary in comparison to any other available field guides to the region, particularly when used in combination with the de La Pena and Rumboll guide 'Birds of Southern South America and Antarctica'. I found Harris's illustrations and detailed descriptions to be much more extensive and truer to color and features than de La Pena. Particularly interesting was the inclusion of line drawings of mammal skeletons, which were much more common ... Read More
Rating: -
This book has good quality pictures. Its strong point is the text for each bird and mammal. The real value of having this book on a recent trip to the Patagonia area was our ability to narrow down our choices of birds for identification making the process easier and speedier. I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to read about and identify wildlife in the Patagonia area.
Rating: -
Harris' knowledge and research, coupled with an excellent artistic hand made this book a critical element to my Patagonian journey. Most notably, his plates are exceptional, and although not nearly as extensive, they are in most cases far superior to the recently released Collins Illustrated Checklist covering birds in the same region. Harris also includes solid notes on each species, sometimes going into very good depth. One frustration was the limits of Harris' coverage: the book is very much "coastal" ... Read More
|
