A field guide is a special breed of book, one not merely to be read. In the heat of the chase, you stop and open it. You let the mosquitoes bite until you verify a field mark. It becomes your constant companion — mine developed a permanent bend down its length from having been stuffed countless times into my back pocket. The more wear it shows, the better you like it, but once it's irretrievably lost, or damaged beyond repair, you forget sentimentality and go out and buy a new one.
My first"Field Guide to the Birds" was the 45th printing of Roger Tory Peterson's third edition, published in 1947 and subtitled, "Giving Field Marks of All Species Found East of the Rockies." No one had told me that if there was one field guide to own, this was it. I came to this conclusion after walking into a bookstore, picking out a likely guide, and carrying it into the field. Of the dozen guides I have acquired since, I always refer to Peterson's first.
Peterson's field guide illustrations have pointers that show the distinguishing characters of each species of bird. This is the "field mark" system that he used in 1934 for the first edition of his book, published when he was 26. Earlier generations had learned about birds by "collecting" or shooting them, and by studying books laden with ornithological detail. Peterson proved that you could learn as much, and feel better about it, by wearing binoculars and carrying his simple guide. Refined in his later guides, the field mark system, which eventually became known as the Peterson System, makes it easy to identify most birds at a glance, the way we usually see them in the field, through binoculars.
A true field guide must be a bantamweight that provides instantly accessible information, so Peterson made simplicity, clarity, and brevity high priorities. He had the uncanny ability to extract from nature the essence of a bird and transfer it to the printed page. The color plates in his guides, reproduced from larger paintings, are free of unnecessary detail, yet they seem lifelike. I was always struck not only by how well he showed what makes a bird distinctive, but also how closely his plates resembled birds I saw in the wild. Many guides with more elaborate painting fail to convey this quality, perhaps because bird artists often work from museum specimens.
Echoing the simplicity of his painting, Peterson's vigorous field guide text tells in the fewest possible words what makes each bird unique. In the 1980 eastern edition, his last on this region, he called the oldsquaw "talkative," the least bittern "furtive," the barn owl "a long-legged, knock-kneed, pale, monkey-faced owl." About the green heron, he noted: "When alarmed it stretches its neck, elevates a shaggy crest, and jerks its tail." The spotted sandpiper "teeters up and down as if a bit too delicately balanced." The scarlet tanager sings like "a robin with a sore throat." His writing was precise yet stylish, and he was a master of the descriptive turn of phrase. Peterson on the brown pelican: "Size, shape, and flight (a few flaps and a glide) indicate a pelican; the dark color and habit of plunging bill-first proclaim it this species."
. . . if you show people how to appreciate wildlife, they will recognize the importance of protecting it. . .
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Although a great believer in wildlife conservation, Peterson did not try to make people environmentally aware by railing about saving the earth. Instead, he painted. Peterson's philosophy seems to have been that if you show people how to appreciate wildlife, they will recognize the importance of protecting it. When I got my first Peterson field guide, all I wanted to know was how to tell the different birds apart. Peterson told me this artistically, but there was artfulness to his method as well. The beautiful simplicity of the field mark system in a sense tricked me into learning about birds without really trying.
More than seven million copies of Peterson's eastern and western bird guides have been sold, and he had been working on a new eastern field guide edition when he died in 1996 at the age of 87. He helped other bird and nature authors by writing introductions to their books. As inventor of the modern field guide — a tool that has brought so many people closer to the natural world — Peterson in his subtle way made a contribution to the American environmental movement that arguably was as profound as Rachel Carson's.
Following Peterson's lead, publishers have been producing a steady stream of field guide and nature titles for decades. Peterson's eastern and western bird guides head the following roundup because they are classics, but they are not the last word on field identification. Bird ranges change over time. Ornithologists periodically adjust bird nomenclature. A new generation of field guide authors is taking a fresh look at birds, here and abroad. The field guide genre continues to evolve.
Although bird guides are sold by bookstores, nature centers, and online booksellers such as Amazon.com, probably the best source for all available titles, especially those covering birds beyond North American borders, is ABA Sales, the mail-order department of the American Birding Association.
The ABA's website (www.americanbirding.org) has an online version of the ABA Sales catalog, or call (800) 634-7736 for a hard copy. The knowledgeable staff of ABA Sales gives willing advice on which guide would be best for where you plan to watch birds.
Robert Winkler, a nature journalist, writes frequently about birds. He lives in Connecticut and can be found online at www.suresite.com/ct/r/rwinkler.
