Evening Grosbeaks at Feeder
Identifying the diversity of birds migrating through your area is made easier with a bird identification field guide. A wide variety of field guides are available for the beginner to advanced birder, with drawings or photos so you can surely find a good fit for your needs.
Each field guide provides narrative details about the diagnostic features of each bird. Diagnostic features are a set of characteristics that are unique to each type of bird, and thus define it as that species.
Field guides also include range maps that indicate where the species occur and its seasonal status (summer, winter, spring/fall, year round resident). Most guides also include tips regarding the species’ preferred habitats and descriptions of their sounds.
Best Field Guides for Beginners & Intermediate Birding Enthusiasts
Stokes Beginners Guide to Eastern Birds
Sometimes beginners can get overwhelmed by too much information; therefore, an ideal solution is a guide that narrows it down to the birds you are likely to see in the birder’s area.
These books feature photos and distribution maps showing where each species occurs in the region or area and their seasonal status. The Stoke’s Beginner Guide to Eastern Birds is a pocket sized guide featuring photos. The Flash Guide to Backyard Birds is a very lightweight and portable option consisting of folding laminated sheets with Peterson’s drawings of the birds.
The next step up from state oriented guides is regional guides, like Peterson’s Guide to Eastern Birds, the Stokes Guide to Eastern Birds, and the Sibley Guide to Eastern Birds. These guides offer drawings and will include most of the birds from common to uncommon that can be seen in in the eastern US. The Audubon and Stoke’s Guides to Eastern Birds also have lots of useful information and great photos of birds you will likely see in your area.
The Big Picture
Peterson Field Guide to North American Birds
If you want to be informed of ALL the possibilities, or you travel a lot, try a guide to birds of North America, like the Sibley Guide and Kaufmann’s Focus Guide. The Sibley Guide is very thorough, featuring multiple drawings of each bird at different angles, even in flight, and for varying ages and stages of plumage. The Peterson Guide is considered by many birding enthusiast to be the gold standard for field guides.
Some birds look different depending on their age (like juvenile, immature and adult); furthermore, some birds change plumage during the year. An example is breeding/summer plumage and non breeding/winter plumage. The range maps feature green dots showing where some species have occurred out of their normal range which is useful in determining where species have shown up as rarities.
The Kaufmann’s Focus Guide contains a lot of useful photos and detailed range maps. The range maps indicate where species normally occur and also extended ranges of where they “scarcely” occur. Keep in mind that birds have wings and occasionally show up at locations outside of their normal range. The Golden Guide to Birds of North America is one of the original field guides and has drawings and range maps with dotted lines that show arrivals dates for migrating species. The National Geographic Field Guide to Birds of North America is another very thorough guide preferred by expert birders.
Closing Thoughts
Your bird book library should include both books with photos and drawings so you can compare the two formats. Photos are more realistic but the resulting images are subject to the angle of the shot, lighting conditions, etc. Drawings are an artist’s rendering of reality, but the artist is in total control of the image details like anatomical features, color patterns, etc. In general, the most popular options are: the Peterson, Kaufmann and Sibley Guides.
Recent Comments