Funny that this book should get a mention as I got a copy
last week and was planning to write a short note on it anyway.
The book (Where to Find Birds in Australasia and Oceania by
Nigel Wheatley) was published last year. I have seen Andrew Isles advertise
it for $55 plus postage. I ordered it through amazon.co.uk, where it cost
GBP 12.79. The cheapest postage option worked out at about GBP 4 (averaging
over three books ordered). That works out at about $42 including postage.
I ordered over the net on a Monday afternoon and had it on Friday from
London (and was glad I didn't pay extra for quicker postage). It's a
hardback and sizewise I guess the best description is that's it's similar to
Simpson and Day's Field Guide.
About 150 of the book's 450 pages are dedicated to
Australia. Like many other books of its type it is clearly designed for the
overseas visitor who wants to travel around the whole country and have a
shot at getting each native species in a short period; you're unlikely to
learn about a new site in your local patch from this book. For example,
Tasmania gets a passage on Mount Wellington and on Bruny Island, and the
rest of the state is covered in two paragraphs. OK for the overseas visitor
only interested in spending two days to get all the endemics, but only so
much use to Australians visiting for longer.
A quick glance shows almost all the sites are ones found in
Thomas and Thomas. In a number of instances they have presumably relied on
the same sources (eg references to the Barking Owls on the petrol pumps at
Victoria River Roadhouse). Hence the problem with Chris Dahlberg's contact
details perhaps. I notice contact details for at least one of the bird
clubs is now outdated too. Although I haven't used the book in the field I
think the instructions on sites are a bit too general. For example it has
details of the Powerful Owls at Epping, Sydney, and says something like
"turn left, cross the stream and look in the trees on the left". I can
imagine people who don't know the sort of spot a Powerful Owl roosts in
wasting a lot of time because they haven't been told it's another 500 odd
metres along the track before they should cross the stream.
As usual in these sorts of books there are birds that are a
bit unusual passed off as regulars (eg a reference to Banded Lapwings at
Hobart airport, though a birder relying on that sentence should at least
find Tasmanian Native Hens, which the book strangely describes as being a
bit difficult to track down near Hobart), and other parts imply that certain
species are a lot harder to see than they really are. But I suppose that is
inevitable where books are written by overseas birders who probably only
visit the sites themselves once, if that. Given that the same author has
done guides for Asia, and I think Africa and South America, one can assume
he hasn't visited all the sites in the book himself, though he has certainly
birded in Australia a fair amount.
At the back of the Australian section it has a checklist
organised around which species are or are not Australian endemics, and in
what part of Australia each species is found.
It uses names and taxonomy from one of the world checklists
so contains many names that would be unfamiliar to Australians (eg Black
tailed Whistler for Mangrove Golden, and it regards the Tasmanian Masked Owl
as a separate species).
The rest of the book is probably going to be of more use to
Australian birders than the Australian section. It covers Irian Jaya and
Papua New Guinea, New Zealand, and a lot of pacific islands (including Fiji,
Samoa, New Caledonia and Hawaii). Many of these islands are ones where no
site guide would previously have been available. In each case, as with
Australia, it lists all the endemic species and then focuses on how the
visiting birder can look for those species, together with an account of what
other species are likely to be seen along the way. Many islands only have
one site listed.
In summary, I think the problem with this book (aside from
any errors of fact like Chris highlighted) is that it attempts to cover too
much territory. It covers the basic sites with less detail than ideal.
Covering Australia in one book is hard enough, but trying to fit in the
entire region is too much. People who already have the books by Bransbury
and Thomas and Thomas won't find much new information in the Australian
section, but the details on other countries would make it worth getting if
you were travelling there.
It has small black and white drawings throughout. If you
see a copy, check out the Magpielark that appears to have inherited its legs
from a stilt!
Murray Lord
Sydney
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