Book Review - A Field Guide to the Birds of Malaysia and Singapore

Hong Kong is ultimately boring so I can only get my 'lifers' through webinar, online birding or reading books. I got my copy of A Field Guide to the Birds of Malaysia and Singapore yesterday, written by Lim Kim Sheng, Yong Ding Li and Lim Kim Chuah who are famous birder in SE Asia. 

There are lots of field guides of SE Asia, especially for Borneo (I also pre-order the Lynx guide for Malaysia, which is coming very soon). I expect a field guide published in 2020 should be better than those in my bookshelf, but sadly this is not the case.

I am quite disappointed with this book and I don't think this is a good field guide for visiting non-beginners, but a fair illustrated checklist which covers both Singapore and Malaysia. The following are my personal thoughts:

A Field Guide to the Birds of Malaysia and Singapore - not a big book so easy to carry

Taxonomy is not 100% updated and consistent. This book contains newly split or described species like Swinhoe's & Hume's White-eye, Spectacled Flowerpecker, Charlotte's Bulbul; but some are only mentioned without illustration or more information like Cream-eyed Bulbul Pycnonotus pseudosimplex and Olive Bulbul Olive Bulbul Iole viridescens; some like the Purple Swamphen complex even remain unsplit. 

Charlotte's Bulbul, split from Buff-vented Bulbul, becoming a endemic species in Borneo which you cannot find in the older field guide

However, I think lots of new (or even old) field guide split the Purple Swamphen complex (at least include a taxonomy note), as Grey-headed Swamphen and Black-backed Swamphen here.

content of the 'Purple Swamphen'

Style of content & illustration description is not consistent, maybe we can see the difference in style of different authors? 

Giant Pitta - named by scientific name in plate

Crested Fireback (not split in this book) - named by common name or place in plate

The illustration I would say, horrible, and some are useless or even wrong for identification. 

Northern vs Brown Boobook

guess what's this pale-eyed bird - Zitting Cisticola

I cannot tell this is a Middendorff's Grasshopper Warbler without reading the content

and I never seen a Eastern-crowned Warbler like this

not to mention the pink legged Yellow-browed Warbler without fringes on tertials (but the tertials fringes are mentioned in the content part)

Illustration is bad doesn't mean the content can help separating easy-confusing species.

ID keys for separating confusing species are seldom mentioned in the content part. If there is, only a sentence or two like teaching you how to tell Bay from Maroon Woodpecker. Provided that the illustration is useless in ID.

When content and illustration cannot help, the mistake in numbering can guide you to the ultimate wrong ID.

number 2 and 4.....

The arrangement is poor too. The confusing species are not putting in the same plate.

I would expect Bridled and Sooty Tern on same plate

or Whiskered and White-winged Tern on same plate... and more examples....

Anyway, this is not a good field guide but still a fine way to learn more about birds of Malaysia and Singapore. I got my copy for around $200 HKD in https://www.bookdepository.com/

Book Review - a preview of Birds of Mongolia

Finally received some books which I pre-ordered in summer, during the HK Book Fair. However, sadly I don't have any spare time to read. Anyway, I still went through several pages and make a preview here.

I have only been to Inner Mongolia, for travel not for birding, but not Mongolia. The two field guides I bought will be a great tool for my travel in future. The first one is the Princeton Field Guides - Birds of Mongolia (right) written by Gombobaatar Sundev & Christopher Leahy and the second one is A Field Guide to the Birds of Mongolia (left) written by Dorj Ganbold & Chris Smith.

the two field guides

For the first one, the illustration is exactly the same style (or even the same) as the other Princeton Field Guides, like the Birds of East Asia, Birds of Central Asia or Birds of Japan. So I don't expect there is excitement about the illustration. For the taxonomy order, it is a little bit random. For example, they put the buttonquail side by side of the quail and pheasant, or a Great Cormorant in between geese and ducks. But still, this guide is comparatively easy-handing and lighter than the following one. 

Birds of Mongolia - buttonquail in pheasant

similar pictures to the Birds of East / Central Asia

For the second field guide - A Field Guide to the Birds of Mongolia, as seen in the above photo, it is a bit bigger than the first one. Also, the cover page is a bit harder than the first book, make it harder to be flipped. I love the style of this field guide more than the first one (a Collin's Style? which I prefer to follow when I publish mine) but the 'jizz, scale and color' of illustration is rather strange (a little bit unnatural?). 

A Field Guide to the Birds of Mongolia - I love the style with identification points the arrow)

Birds of Mongolia - difference of Ruff

A Field Guide to the Birds of Mongolia 

Birds of Mongolia - don't forget we have seen Mongolia Lark in Hong Kong already haha!

If I need to choose one of them, I still prefer the second one. At least more identification basis and more organised. Anyway, I still need to make my final recommendation after reading the whole book. 

Book Review - Birds of Thailand (2018)

Another book about birds of Thailand, just arrived few days ago. A quick review of this highly recommended book (even a bit expensive) and the first of the series - Lynx and BirdLife International Field Guides published by Lynx. More info as here: https://www.lynxeds.com/product/birds-thailand-0

we really wanna bird in Thailand one day!

the format or style is likely following the other Lynx field guide like Birds of New Guinea. But this one includes the QR code link to online media and conservation status from BirdLife

the taxonomy is more or less the same as HBW Alive!

distribution of different subspecies in Thailand is shown in the map, a feature I love

Book Review - Waders of Europe, Asia & North America

As I had a 10% off discount in Book Depository 2 weeks ago and I did not know what books to buy, I chose the Waders of Europe, Asia & North America, written by Stephen Message Don Taylor in 2005. This is an old book (luckily not many taxonomy changes in Charadriiformes in recent years), and we have plenty waders book in our book shelf, so a few sample photos of this book were uploaded here.

Waders of Europe, Asia & North America, this one is a field guide, unlike the photographic one which we bough long time ago

this book is divided into two main parts: at rest and in flight, allowing a quick check of particular wader in field, which is quite useful

in flight part: the pictures are not the best among the waders books but still good, and excellent for a quick Charadriiformes revision

the table for key ID points in appendix is another convenient feature for this guidebook

Book Review - Birds of Japan (2018)

We are birders who base in HK, and love going Japan for food, toys and especially birds. Mark Brazil’s Birds of East Asia is always one of the most useful bird guide to us so when we knew he was writing a Japan bird guide (again), we immediately pre-ordered one.

And the copy finally arrived yesterday, so I quickly opened box and made a short review here.

Birds of Japan

You can say the Birds of Japan is a revised edition of Birds of East Asia and focus on one particular country right now. The drawings are BoEA style, and so the writings. So it is very user friendly tobirders who read BoEA before. However, as many drawings are using the one in BoEA, some pictures can be misleading in identification. For example, you can easily tell the difference of Swinhoe’s / Pintail / Latham Snipe just by the pictures in book but never a real case in field until you see their tail clearly!

the drawings and style are same as BoEA 

picture of snipes, you can tell the difference of these species by drawings but not a case in field

compare to BoEA, a pdf version

In this version, it is not surprised to see many new species which were first recorded in Japan or newly split by IOC.

Orii Tit, or Iriomote Tit, a recent split and we missed in Iriomotejima

Taxonomy mainly followed IOC, but some ‘advanced split’ is more likely following HBW / Birdlife.

the robins are split in this book, like in HBW / Birdlife

compare to BoEA, a pdf version

Overall, the information here is very up-to-datea and this is a highly recommended book for birders in / visiting E Asia and Japan.

Book Review - Birds of Spain

I still haven't decided where is the next long trip destination, but hopefully somewhere outside Asia. Spain maybe a choice, a place we never been to. I bought this guide (English version) for around HKD 197 include all shipping.

This book is really handy even it is hardback, just slightly longer than a pen. Pictures are good enough to identify birds in Spain but some need improvement; words are easy. And more drawings about the similar species especially the vagrants will be nicer.

Anyway, this is a good, light bird guide, enough for a birding trip in Spain.

a small-sized field guide

words and picture

some difficult species

Book Review - Roberts Bird Guide (Second Edition)

We haven't been to Africa yet, and South Africa is one of my target places to boost my lifer list in coming years. I bought this book - Roberts Bird Guide (Second Edition) from NHBS more than a month ago, and after some problems in shipping, it was finally shipped to Hong Kong last week.

Quickly read through the book, this book is really useful for birders who want to visit southern part of Africa. The drawings are fantastic, words are easy to be understood, making this book to be a first choice for birder who wanna know more about south African birds. As it is covering nearly 1000 species, distributed in several countries, this book is quite thick and heavy when comparing to other field guide. However, as it is very informative and useful, this excellent field guide is still highly recommended no matter you will go to South Africa or not.

For more information, you can check here: http://www.robertsbirds.co.za/sa-guide.htm

this is the second edition, with a cover of a Secretarybird

photos are included in some difficult species, exactly what I want to do if publishing a field guide

key features are highlighted in difficult species too

drawings are excellent, like the wader page

Book Review - A Field Guide to the Birds of Thailand (2016)

We bought many books about birds and I think I can start writing some simple and general book review about these books..

As I am planning a trip to Thailand (not yet decided the date), I want to know more about the birds of Thailand. I bought the book: A Field Guide to the Birds of Thailand, written by Craig Robson and published by Bloomsbury in 2016.

Craig Robson is an expert about the birds of South-East Asia. And I also own his another publication - A Field Guide To The Birds Of South-East Asia, which is a great book. As I want to know more the specific distribution and a more handy Thailand field guide, I bought the Birds of Thailand.

This book contains more than 950 maps for individual species and many color plates, but I made a careless mistake, I initially thought this is a new edition and so the data would be up-to-date. However, this is a republished edition for the 2002 one. Bird information may be outdated, especially talking some change in taxonomy and distribution and making this book less user friendly. The good thing is, this field guide is light and portable enough for a trip.

Conclusion: if you are going to Thailand or studying the birds of Thailand, better to use the book - A Field Guide To The Birds Of South-East Asia, which is more informative; if you are a lazy birder like me, this portable guide can be still recommended.

a very handy guide

 the taxonomy is a bit out-dated (as this one is the 2002 edition), like the Rufous-bellied Swallow Cecropis badia  from Striated Swallow (some authors also lump this with Red-rumped Swallow)

 like the paradise-flycatcher, I think both Blyth's and Amur can be found in Thailand

P.S. According to the advertisement in the Birding Asia, the Lynx is going to published another field guide to the birds of Thailand, which can be better for my future trip.