What is the best field guide for Central America (1 Viewer)

Hi,
I am on my way to Ecuador and then Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras etc and would like to know what would be the best general field guide for this area.
Any advice would be appreciated
Regards
Luke

delougl said:

Hi,
I am on my way to Ecuador and then Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras etc and would like to know what would be the best general field guide for this area.
Any advice would be appreciated
Regards
Luke

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The one by Steve Howell and Sophie Webb covers the northern part of Central America along with Mexico but most of the places you mention are not included in 'northern'. There is a good guide to Costa Rican birds by Skutch and Gardner. Worth a look might be Ridgeley and Gwynne, The Birds of Panama with Costa Rica, Nicaragua and Honduras- it looks OK but I have never used it.

Steve

And Ecuador has a superb two-volume guide all to itself.

Steve

Largely I agree with the recommendations in the previous posts. Ecuador has a superb guide by Ridgely, one of the best fieldguides available for any Neotropical country. Unless you've got a very big backback I'd recommend that you only bring the fieldguide volume. The other volume is more of a scientific volume that deals with taxonomy and alike. To cover Costa Rica, Nicaragua & Honduras you'd need the Skutch and Gardner guide to Costa Rica and Howell & Webb's guide to Mexico & N. Central America. Ridgely's Panama guide is great for Panama, but I wouldn't recommend it for the countries further north as the chapter dealing with the birds of Costa Rica, Nicaragua and Honduras was added later. Hence, using it in e.g. Costa Rica involves a lot of annoying paging back and forth between the species dealt with in the Panama part and the species dealt with in the Costa Rica/Nicaragua/Honduras part - something you really don't need when dealing with species that already can be rather difficult to ID for anyone not familiar with Neotropical avifauna. Furthermore, the species dealt with in the Panama chapter lack specific comments on distribution in the remaining countries.

Depending on when you leave you might want to bring Collins Field Guide to the Birds of Mexico and Central America by Ber van Perlo, which will be published within the next year instead of Skutch's Costa Rica guide and Howell & Webb's Mexico & N. Central America guide. While this new guide is likely to have a text that is far more brief, it is likely to have a number of advantages and could very well be better suited for you (e.g. far more manageble size, updated info on distributions, etc.). Anyway, in short:

Ecuador: Ridgely's Birds of Ecuador vol. 2 (the fieldguide volume). For Ecuadorian voices I can recommend the CD-ROM Birds of Ecuador by Niels Krabbe and Jonas Nilsson.

Costa Rica: Skutch & Stiles' Guide to the Birds of Costa Rica.

Nicaragua & Honduras: Howell & Webb's A Guide to the Birds of Mexico and Northern Central America. Sure, there's a part of Nicaragua it doesn't cover, but the few Nicaraguan species not included are found in the Costa Rican guide.

Depending on when you leave the yet to be published Collins Field Guide to the Birds of Mexico and Central America by Ber Van Perlo may be a better option. Not at least because it will cover entire Central America, thereby replacing both the book by Skutch & Stiles and the book by Howell & Webb. Obviously, you would still need the guide to Ecuador (the avifauna of Ecuador is, except for the Chocó region, very unlike the avifauna of Central America).

Enjoy your trip, it's an amazing region.

Fully agree

The Costa Rican guide and the Ecuadorian guide are both EXCELLENT. The guide to the birds of Panama (the updated edition which also includes Costa Rica, Nicaragua, and Honduras) is very good as well, but it may not be easy to find birds in the plates. If you don't mind the price of buying them all, I feel it (the Panama guide) is well worth the price. But Stiles and Skutch's Costa Rican guide and Greenfield and Ridgely's Ecuardor guide are both MUST-HAVES. As for Howell and Webb's Mexico & Northern Central America guide, it is the best in the region it covers. A good deal of the Central American birds you see will be covered here, but I'm not sure if it is a must-have since the region is a bit north of where you are headed (except possibly Honduras).
Anyways, have fun on your trip...sounds like lots of fun!

swamp_rattler said:

As for Howell and Webb's Mexico & Northern Central America guide, it is the best in the region it covers. A good deal of the Central American birds you see will be covered here, but I'm not sure if it is a must-have since the region is a bit north of where you are headed (except possibly Honduras)

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There are many species in Honduras not covered by the Costa Rican guide (if dividing Central America into zoogeographic regions, Honduras and Costa Rica are in different regions and there are some clear differences in avifauna). So, no doubts the Howell & Webb guide is a must-have for any birder visiting Honduras. BTW, Luke (aka "delougl"), you might want to take a look at Tom Jenner's page. It provides much useful info on both Guatemala & Honduras:

http://mayanbirding.com/

anybody try A Field Guide to the Birds of Mexico and Central America by Irby Davis?

swamp_rattler said:

anybody try A Field Guide to the Birds of Mexico and Central America by Irby Davis?

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The Davis guide was the only one available for anything south of Guatemala at the time of its publication more than 30 years ago. However, Davis was a splitter (maybe he was ahead of his time, and in line with today's tendencies?), and he made up names that were not accepted by the established crowd. Thus, if you wanted to use the book on a comparative level you had to work heavily on the names of the book (making name changes and lumping "species"). I don't assume there has ever been a updated version. And therefore, I would not recommend this book at all!

The texts were very brief, more along the lines of van Perlo's books, but no range maps. The illustrations were of variable quality, but at the time, the book was a great help for me, and it was compact as well.

In my opinion, the only field guide to use north of Nicaragua is Howell and webb, with the exception of parts of eastern Honduras in the Mosquitia, which are better covered by the Costa Rica Guide. Once you get into western Honduras and head further up into Guatemala and elsewhere, there is a big change in the avifauna and you will no longer be able to use the Costa Rica guide or Ridgely's Panama guide (even though it says that it includes Honduras). The disadvantage is that it doesn't include plates of the migrants and its also quite big to carry. An alternative is the guide by Preston Edwards, which includes the migrants, but is nowhere near the quality of Howell and Webb.
It will a great trip whichever books you use.

Tom

Ber van Perlo, Mexico and Central America

A brief, informal review of Ber van Perlo's Illustrated Checklist for Mexico and C.A. is now available at

www.birdaz.com/blog

Rick Wright
Tucson

Rick Wright said:

A brief, informal review of Ber van Perlo's Illustrated Checklist for Mexico and C.A. is now available at

www.birdaz.com/blog

Rick Wright
Tucson

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Thanks for the link Rick
I have only had the chance for a quick look through this new guide and I am in general agreement with this review. Given the huge number of species in the region, van Perlo has made a pretty good effort, but I still can't see any serious birder wanting to travel in the region without the books described above. There are few good books covering Central America and I have tried to buy a copy of all of them. However, I did not buy this book because I didn't see that it had anything new to offer.

Tom

any further info to add for a trip to just Nicaragua and Costa Rica?
Would these guides cover it?
"A Guide to the Birds of Costa Rica by F.Gary Stiles & Alexander F. Skutch"
"Howell & Webb's A Guide to the Birds of Mexico and Northern Central America."
Any more developments since this thread was written?

Any thoughts on
"Collins - Birds of Mexico and Central America Book by Ber van Perl"
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=330214134749&fromMakeTrack=true&ssPageName=VIP:watchlink:top:uk
Ebay Item number: 330214134749

THANKS IN ADVANCE FOR ANY HELP!!!!

The big change is the publication of Garrigues and Dean http://www.amazon.com/Birds-Costa-Rica-Field-Guide/dp/080147373X which is an excellent guide to Costa Rica. I've discussed it elsewhere, but in summary, I feel that it is probably the best field guide for identification for a birder visiting Costa Rica only. One big advantage is that it has range maps for Costa Rica, but one disadvantage is the limted text. Stiles and Skutch has a lot more additional information such as habitats, breeding etc.
As described above, I would only recommend the van Perle book for someone travelling right up through Central America and Mexico that needed to travel light. It is not up to the quality of the other books.
For just Costa Rica and Nicaragua, I wonder if you really need Howell and Webb, as there will be very few species in Nicaragua that are not in the Costa Rica guides. However, its by far the best book for anywhere in Latin America and will be a great asset for certain difficult groups like raptors.
Have a great trip and let us all know what you see.

Tom

So (just for clarrification hope you dont mind!) in your opinion would you go for The Birds of Costa Rica: A Field Guide (Paperback) by Richard Garrigues to cover both Nica and Costa and leave the Howell and Webb?
Or would Howell and Webb do the same job cover both Nica & Costa and be a better quality guide to do it? I am not to bothered about weight or saving a few pound. Would rather have the best book/books for the 2 countries.
What kinf of Nica Birds will it leave out? Its nica that most of my time will be spent in.
Massive thanks for your info btw.

I'm not familiar with the birds of Nicaragua, but for Costa Rica, you definitely will want Garrigues. As previously mentioned, it has range maps which Stiles & Skutch do not have. Also, it's small enough to be easily carried into the field. The taxonomy is also more up-to-date.
If packing is no concern, then I would also recommend taking the Stiles & Skutch guide. It has very extensive text which will probably help a lot. It will be more helpful for CR than Howell & Webb.
And finally, you may want to bring Howell & Webb for Nicaragua. I just don't know how many birds there won't be covered by the CR guides.

There aren't that many species found in Nicaragua that aren't in Costa Rica as well, but there are a number of important ones. There is a Birdlife endemic bird area in northern Central America and Chiapas in Mexico that extends into the highlands of western Nicaragua. Such important species as White-breasted Hawk, White-bellied Chachalaca, White-faced Quail-Dove, Red-throated Parakeet, Pacific Parakeet, Fulvous Owl (I think), Emerald-chinned Hummingbird, Green-breasted Mountain-gem, Blue-tailed Hummingbird, Bushy-crested Jay, Rufous-browed Wren, Slate-coloured Solitaire and Blue-crowned Chlorophonia. There will probably be a few other species from further north in Mexico that extend this far south, but these are the important ones. Howell and Webb is quite big, but still worth taking, even if you leave it in the Hotel room. In the north west of Nicaragua Howell and Webb will probably be the best guide, but there will also be some birds not found (especially along the north coast and in rain forest). Howell and Webb is not suitable to use on its own in Costa Rica. There are probably hundreds of species that it does not have. In short, the most important guide for you is Garrigues and Dean, but Howell and Webb would be very useful in Nicaragua and Stiles and Skutch would be nice to have as well, if you have the space, because it would give you a lot more detailed information on the Costa Rican species.
There is almost no information on birding in Nicaragua (as you have probably found), so please consider taking lots of notes on where you travel to write a trip report for us here at birdforum.

Tom

Wow! Thanks for the info. Really appreciated and very helpful.
Amazing that there is not much info. Cheers TOm for the species list that wont be in Garrigues. Enjoyed your Mayanbirding website to Tom.
:t:

I haven't owned the Davis book for easily 20 years...if I recall correctly, several species accounts were nothing but voice descriptions and range information. Not very useful information you ask me.

Microtus said:

I haven't owned the Davis book for easily 20 years...if I recall correctly, several species accounts were nothing but voice descriptions and range information. Not very useful information you ask me.

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I still have the book, so I checked. There is much variation in the treatment of the species. There are some groups where the situation is as you say, notably the wrens and the motmots. Most had been treated better, however. Not necessarily with longer texts, but more evenly distributed information.