Travel to South America

Brazil: Amazon And Pantanal (Travellers' Wildlife Guides)

Format: Paperback
Author: David L. Pearson
ReleaseDate: 15 July, 2005
Publisher: Interlink
Rating:

Not a field guide, but a good read
The book is excellent on some points, and severely lacking on others. My wife bought this book for me for our recent trip to Brazil, including the Pantanal and southern Amazon.

Since this book covers the gamut from insects to birds to reptiles to amphibians to mammals, I knew right from the start that it would have a very limited usefullness in terms of identifying individual species that we were seeing, and I was right. I was travelling with a couple of friends who are wildlife biologists. They too had the book. We all stopped carrying the book when we were out because it wasn't worth the weight in our packs. There are simply far too many species left out of this book for it to be useful as a field guide. With so many species, many of which look quite a bit alike, you will very rarely be certain that the animal you just saw is exactly the one in the book. For those who find it important to know exactly what you just saw, this book is not for you. If you can find it, Aves Brasiliera (All the Birds of Brazil) is a much better choice, IF you can find it. Our guide at the All the Birds of Brazil book, and it was far better, though obviously only covered a narrower topic than this book.

Now for the good. Before the trip, I read this book cover to cover, which is very unusual for me for "field guides". I found the book to be very well written, with good (though sometimes rather general, as I would expect) information about the ecology of the two regions, as well as general information about the species covered. Since Brazil contains many species that are vastly different than what I normally see in North America, I found the guide to be an excellent introduction for my trip, and though I only used it to identify individual species several times, I found that my detailed reading of it before the trip often useful in at least narrowing a bird down to type. So I could look at something and say, "Oh, that's a manakin of some kind. " Beyond that, I relied on our EXCELLENT guide and his extensive knowledge or his birds of Brazil book.

To illustrate the above, this book contains (by quick count) plates and descriptions for 187 birds. During the nearly three weeks I was there, I saw 257 different species of birds, and I didn't see, and there are a lot of birds in the book that I didn't see. It's easy to do the math and figure out that the book is not good for (nor is it designed for) identification, per se.

So my recommendation: If you traveling to Brazil and don't already know a huge amount about the region, buy this book, read it before you go, maybe even take it with you as an evening reference, but for identifying individual species, you're better off using the knowledge of an experienced guide.

Oh, one other minor gripe. Despite the generally very high quality of the physical book itself, the humidity in Brazil appears to have accelerated the deterioration of the book. One would think that for a book designed to be taken to a wet climate, more care would have gone into making it withstand that climate. Maybe I just got a bad copy though.

So despite the short-comings of the book, which are largely by design, I give this book 4 stars. It is well done.

Brazil-Amazon
It can't do it; no book can. This book attempts to cover the whole gamut of wildlife for the Amazon basin and Pananal. It did make an admirable attempt and as such is a great book for the tourist traveling to the area. On a recent trip north of Manaus, it covered 98% of the bird life. It is concise enough that the occaisional bird wathcer will be able to identify most birds. It is not quite as adequate for other species- fish are very superficial, as are reptiles. I would like to see these expanded. This is a terrific guide for the tourist- concise, adequately complete, and easy to use.

good reference for specific ecosystems
The book is specific to only two geographic areas: The Pantanal and the Amazon, admittedly, Brazil's biggest natural draws. I used this book for a recent trip to Brazil's Pantanal. However, since the Pantanal and the Atlantic rainforest were my destinations, the book's usefulness was only partially utilized. Also, it is a heavy volume, and when considered with the other guidebooks I packed and used for cross-referencing, this book was by far the heftiest.

The book does fill a unique niche, that of ecology and natural history guide to these two unique wild places. No other book that is easily carried provides as much enjoyable natural history reading on the Amazon and Pantanal. The illustration plates are uniformly excellent, but it is not noted whether species occur outside of the Pantanal and Amazon. Many species do occur outside, as I quickly found out. Eliminating the rest of Brazil all together just seems a bit restricting. An average traveller to Brazil is most likely to make a stop in Rio de Janeiro, perhaps visit the easily accessible Parque National de Tijuca, and wonder if what they're seeing is that similar looking bird in their book.

Brazil is a big country, and no guidebook has yet to cover all its flora and fauna in one volume, in English, and travel-sized. This guidebook attempts to cover at least the animals and birds of Brazil's largest natural treasures, and succeeds for the most part. Given its quality of illustrations and plates, written descriptions of behavior, ecology and geography, this book is a good when used in conjunction with other bird and mammal guides.

Related products:
click image or link for details on these South America travel books.

	Birds of Southern South America and Antarctica.
	Pantanal: South America's Wetland Jewel
	Amazon Basin Map
	Insight Guide Amazon Wildlife (Insight Guides Amazon Wildlife)