Handbook Of Bird Families

by Jonathan Elphick

What's the difference between a swallow and a swift? How many species of ducks, penguins, owls or thrushes are there? Which is the rarest parrot or the most endangered hummingbird? What do toucans eat? Discover all the key facts about the world's orders and families of birds with this ultimate handbook. Expert ornithologist Jonathan Elphick provides a comprehensive survey of every one of the 36 orders and 234 families of birds, revealing their remarkable diversity, appearance, behaviour and lifestyle. With clear, lively text, informative fact boxes that include the latest research and data, and special photography from award-winning wildlife photographers such as David Tipling, The Handbook of Bird Families belongs on the shelf of everyone interested in birds.

Genres: Birds, Nonfiction, Nature, Science

416 pages, Paperback

Published October 11, 2018

About the author

Jonathan Elphick is a British natural history writer, editor, ornithologist, and zoologist known for his extensive work on birds, conservation, and the cultural history of ornithology. Raised in North Wales, he developed an early fascination with birdlife and later earned a zoology degree from University College, Swansea. After working as an in-house natural history editor for several publishers, including Dorling Kindersley, he became a freelance specialist focusing primarily on birds and wildlife. Elphick has written, edited, or contributed to numerous acclaimed titles including The Birdwatcher's Handbook, Birds: The Art of Ornithology, The Natural History Museum Atlas of Bird Migration, and Birds Britannica. His work combines scientific research, conservation, art history, travel, and field observation. A Fellow of both the Zoological Society of London and the Linnean Society of London, he has also collaborated on international conservation and publishing projects exploring humanity's relationship with birds across cultures worldwide.

Reviews

[Jeffrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent at conveying the global diversity of birds (there are almost 11 000 species named and I found myself encountering genera and families that I had never heard of before on a regular basis within). The photographs are excellent, though often small. The text is also very small print, which could be a challenge to some readers.

Each family of birds receives at least 1 or two paragraphs of broad overview as well as a fact-box with quick stats, some families which are hyper-diverse being allotted 3-5 pages of text. The text mainly catalogues diversity, by describing which subfamilies the family is divided into, how many and which genera are in what parts of the world and brief snippets of natural history and behaviour throughout.

There were editorial errors on a regular basis unfortunately... it felt like paragraphs had been reassigned to different Bird Families after being written because of taxonomic changes or as though they were pieces of a previous book, shifted into a new context without being thoroughly proofread. This caused some confusion, but not too much, and overall the amount of information within about bird diversity was absolutely worth the occasional re-read of a confusing paragraph. I think it could have used a more thorough editor but overall very good book cataloguing the world's avi-fauna.

[Barry Avis · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Handbook Of Bird Families by Jonathan Elphick is a coffee table sized reference book which shows describes the orders and families of all the birds of the world. Each section starts with a description of the order of birds being described and then a table that identified such things as range, food, eggs and conservation status. The chapter then describes various members of the family, their characteristics, some biology and highlights specific species that fall into that order.
This will be a book I go back to again and again as I want to refresh myself about specific families and species. It is definitely a reference book to be had by every avid birdwatcher.
My only gripe is that although each section highlights how many genus and species there are for each family I would have liked a list in each section of which birds fall into that family, maybe just the scientific names to get around the variation in names across the globe.
Overall, a great reference book that I will use multiple times.

[Phil Webster · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very useful – and beautifully illustrated – reference work which shows us all the orders and families of the birds of the world.

There are approximately 10,000 species of birds in the world today. Similar, closely related, species are grouped into a genus; similar genera are grouped into families, and similar families are grouped into orders.

So this book is divided into sections based on the orders, and within each of these sections there is a sub-section on each of the families within that order.

The sub-sections on families tell us how many genera and species there are in each family, and give detailed information on behaviour, conservation status etc.

The book is very up-to-date. For example, it shows that falcons and hawks are no longer believed to be closely related.

My only criticism is that it would have been useful if the book had included a diagram (such as I have seen in other books and on the internet) of the “evolutionary tree” of birds, showing how all these orders and families are related.

[Ethan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good reference book