A fast review of HMW vol. 1: First, do keep in mind that while I do have a “fair level” of knowledge about mammals, I am certainly not an expert and could therefore easily have missed something (not to forget that this is based on first impressions rather than a thorought check through every single part of the book).
I’ll start with what IMO is the primary weakness in an otherwise excellent work: Subspecies. In most species, there are no descriptions of subspecies (how they differ from each other - they do include the usual lists of the subspecies+their distribution in the intro of each species). I am well aware that mammalian taxonomy overall is far behind that of birds (far fewer people working with mammalian taxonomy & often far fewer specimens available, making it harder to accurately judge geographical variations), but even in species where the basis for recognizing the subspecies is relatively well known, it is often not mentioned in text. The same is the case in species where geographical variations in e.g. colour are relatively well known, even if they do not necessarily match currently recognized subspecies well. For example, while it is mentioned that the color of the South American Coati is very variable, ranging from very dark brown to orange, none of the geographical patterns in this variation – as I described in the earlier post #9 – are mentioned. The same is the case with many other species. Related to this, they generally do not mention IUCN Red List status for subspecies (only for species), e.g. no mention of the fact that the Asiatic Lion (
Panthera leo persica) is rated as Endangered, or that the Iriomote Cat (
Prionailurus bengalensis iriomotensis) is rated as Critically Endangered. Secondly, in many cases they have an IMO odd approach to species where a new review of the subspecific taxonomy is needed: They disregard all “traditionally” recognized subspecies and consider the species monotypic, as can be seen in e.g. the Stone Marten, Common Slender Mongoose, Eurasian Otter, Common Palm Civet and Binturong (in the last they somewhat oddly include illustrations of two subspecies and mention them in the taxonomy section, but don’t have any subspecies in the list). True, in these and several others the “traditional” subspecific boundaries are likely not entirely correct, but taxonomic work – as is the case with all scientific work – builds on top of previous knowledge (it is not a start from zero, as suggested by removing all “traditional” subspecies). As can be seen in both birds and mammals where there have been recent reviews of the subspecies, there really are few cases where earlier generations of taxonomists didn’t get it at least partially right... partially right is better than nothing. In other cases they evidently are aware of new work, but for some reasons chose not to follow it. For example, the recently described
quinlingensis subspecies of the Giant Panda (also mentioned in some of the first posts of this thread) is not recognized, even if the taxonomic intro for the Giant Panda says: “No subspecies yet recognized, although one population in Quingling Mountains, Shaanxi Province, shows differences in cranial and dental morphology, pelage characteristics, and genetics indications of isolation for several thousand years, and a subspecies designation (
quinlingensis) has been proposed.” With all that, and no arguments presented for why it should not be recognized, I find it puzzling why they still do not recognize it. Likewise, several studies (as they also mention) have shown that the various African subspecies of the Leopard should be considered synonymous. They do not mention any reasons for disregarding these studies, but still end up listing the several “traditional” African subspecies. Nevertheless, they evidently are fully aware of even very recent taxonomic publications/ideas, as there are few cases where they do not mention them somewhere (either in the systematic section of the family or under the taxonomic section of the individual species). E.g. they mention the very recent idea of splitting the Hog Badger into three species (even if they end up contradicting themselves in that species' entry versus plate) and – finally – a much needed review of the olingos has dealt with the previous complete taxonomic mess of that genus, though it means that they are forced to list one of the species as “Bassaricyon n. sp”, as they managed to beat the publication of the official species description. It should be noted that they (with very few exceptions, e.g. the Chinese Mountain Cat, where I have been unable to find any mention of the genetic work that suggests it should be considered a subspecies of
F. silvestris [catus]) use what I would consider up-to-date species and generic limits, i.e. the previous mentioned issues are generally restricted to the lower level of subspecies.
The photos are, as we are used to from the bird equivalent HBW, plentiful and generally excellent: Like a Sand Cat having a go at a small viper and a Lion dealing with a young African Elephant (yes I know some might consider that last photo gruesome, but to disregard something like this in a book about Carnivores would IMO have been highly questionable and diminished the books value), a Margay showing its capability of climbing head-first down a tree trunk, encounters between a group of Banded Mongooses and a group of Common Dwarf Mongooses, a resting Banded Mongoose lying flat on its belly with all four limbs pointing outwards leading to an almost cartoonish look, a series of photos showing a “mouse leap” through snow by an Arctic Fox, a Gray Wolf – Brown Bear encounter, Giant Otter – Spectacled Caiman encounter, a Wolverine that looks seriously mad and as a direct opposite a playing young Wolverine rolling around on its back with its leg in the air and the tongue hanging out, not to forget photos of relatively poorly known rarities like the Andean Cat, Hose’s Palm Civet, Golden Palm Civet, Liberian Mongoose, Darwin’s Fox, Mountain Coati, Pygmy Spotted Skunk, etc. I do wonder if the identification of the "Tibetan Fox" on page 402 is correct, but perhaps I'm simply being fooled by the appearance of young individuals of this species (I've mentioned issues with certain identification in the bird equivalent HBW elsewhere;
http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=125169).
The plates, too, are generally excellent and IMO belong among the best I have seen for mammals (something I admittedly feared a bit before receiving the book, considering the "mixed" quality of mammal illustrations in many field guides). There really are very few where I have some issues, and where I do they are in general minor. The fact remains; they are generally among the best mammal illustrations I have seen. It also appears they added quite a few illustrations in the last period of the production, as some may have noticed from the change in the sample plates available on the Lynx Edicions homepage. For example, they now have both the brown and white Black Bears (see post #2) and Syrian Brown Bears (post #3; there are now illustrations of 6 subspecies of the Brown Bear). In general, the coverage of subspecies/variants/morphs on the plates is excellent, and there are few cases where I think an extra illustration would have added any significant to the value of this work. Furthermore, unlike the bird equivalent HBW, HMW includes illustrations of animals in the winter pelage when it differs significantly from summer, and in a small number of cases (several of the large cats) they even included illustrations of juveniles.
I have very little to add on the main text (family & species), and the sections I have checked generally appear both thorough and up-to-date. In addition to all the “usual” stuff, I was quite pleased to see that they included dental formulas in many species, which are quite important in several mammalian groups. I have not spend any greater amount of time checking the first chapter, which is an overall introduction to mammals (skeleton, respiratory system, metabolism, various types of locomotion, lactation, behaviors, etc), but it appeared to be a good, although brief, introduction to the various matters.
So, overall this appears to be the start of yet another excellent series, but with room for improvements on the issues mentioned in the first section of this review. On a 10-point scale (0= worst; 10 = perfect) with the last few volumes of the bird equivalent HBW rating at 8 or 9, HMW vol. 1 would be 7 or 8. Recommended for anyone with a more serious interest in mammals than just the usual "big and famous" species.