A Wildlife Guide to Chile: Continental Chile, Chilean Antarctica, Easter Island, Juan Fernandez Archipelago | 
| Author: Sharon Chester
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Category: Book
Buy New: $45.00
New (9) Used (1) from $45.00
Avg. Customer Rating:  3 reviews
Sales Rank: 289108
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 400
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.8
Dimensions (in): 8.7 x 5.9 x 1.6
ISBN: 0691129754
Dewey Decimal Number: 591.983
EAN: 9780691129754
ASIN: 0691129754
Publication Date: July 21, 2008
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Product Description
This is the first comprehensive English-language field guide to the wildlife of Chile and its territories--Chilean Antarctica, Easter Island, Juan Fernandez, and San Felix y San Ambrosio. From bats to butterflies, lizards to llamas, and ferns to flamingos, A Wildlife Guide to Chile covers the country's common plants and animals. The color plates depict species in their natural environments with unmatched vividness and realism. The combination of detailed illustrations and engaging, succinct, and authoritative text make field identification quick, easy, and accurate. Maps, charts, and diagrams provide information about landforms, submarine topography, marine environment, climate, vegetation zones, and the best places to view wildlife. This is an essential guide to Chile's remarkable biodiversity. - The only comprehensive English-language guide to Chile's common flora and fauna
- The first guide to cover Chile and its territories--Chilean Antarctica, Easter Island, Juan Fernandez, and San Felix y San Ambrosio
- 120 full-color plates allow quick identification of more than 800 species
- Accompanying text describes species size, shape, color, habitat, and range
- Descriptions list size, distribution, and English, Spanish, and scientific names
- Information on the best spots to view wildlife, including major national parks
- Compact and lightweight--a perfect field guide
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| Customer Reviews:
 A welcome addition to the South American naturalist's library September 17, 2008
The South American countries are characterised by a very high natural diversity coupled with a relative scarcity of biologists and field naturalists, the result of which is a paucity of popular literature which would enable the curious resident or visitor to easily identify what he/she encounters. Admittedly, in recent years, the lack of reliable field guides is being successfully addressed for at least one group, and there are now excellent - if heavy! - guides to the birds of almost all of the countries of highest diversity. Even so, field guides to any other groups remain a rarity. So it was a very pleasant surprise to come across Sharon Chester's new book, particularly because it aims not just to identify the butterflies or the reptiles, but to provide a broad overview of the entire natural history of Chile and its territories. As far as I know, there is nothing similar available for mainland Chile and since this guide also covers the all Chilean territories, it will be of interest for visitors to the Antarctic too.
The book is very well organised and carefully laid out: it must have been a real labour of love for its creator, who wrote the nearly 400 pages of small text and produced the photographically derived illustrations. In scope it is a general guide to the natural history of Chile, something along the lines of the Ecotravellers' Wildlife Guide series but, to my taste, better put together. After an overview of Chile's natural environments and ecology, subsequent chapters tackle marine organisms, flora, lepidoptera, reptiles and amphibians, birds (by far the largest section, though it does not replace Jaramillo's excellent Birds of Chile (Princeton Field Guides)) and mammals, after which there is a short gazetteer on wildlife viewing sites. The text is concise and informative and the illustrations very lifelike. The book would fit easily into a coat pocket, so it could be used as a true field guide, but is more likely to be used to plan trip or as reference back at base camp.
Should the potential visitor to Chile, the Chilean Antarctic or any other territories buy this book? Definitely! The book will certainly make a Chilean trip more enjoyable for the birder and general naturalist - there is nothing else comparable. And if you need further convincing, at under $14, it has to be one of the bargain nature books of 2008.
Highly recommended!
Chris Sharpe, 17 September 2008. ISBN: 0691129762
Excellent guide to wildlife of Chile and the Antarctic Peninsula August 19, 2008
The book's appearance is quite appropriate to its genre and has immediate appeal. From a graphic standpoint, its organization seems intuitive and inviting. The text is engaging and accessible, clearly written on an introductory level, but also providing detailed, specific information that suffices for intermediate-level comprehension of the distinctions among species. In some cases, these distinctions are not widely known to most professional naturalists -- for instance, in rodents, moths, or lizards -- and this guide provides the only readily accessible material in English of any sort. The combination of the very basic with the genuinely obscure lends the book great utility and great charm.
It is refreshing to see a field guide that has had so much care taken in its preparation and layout, such careful attention to small details and to the ways in which readers would approach and use such a book. The pioneering use of floral backgrounds with key species seems one of the book's real strengths.
The guide is essentially a set of six field guides with brilliant front matter and back matter that answer many of the questions that arise in the context of travel and learning. Any student of natural history would find the book essentially indispensable for reference, although the material makes very nice reading outside the background of travel or research as well. And travelers will appreciate the coverage given to Chilean Antarctica, Easter Island and the Juan Fernandez Archipelago.
Other than Alvaro Jaramillo's excellent bird guide to Chile, or Shirihai's impressive guide to the Antarctic, I cannot think of a book that would overlap much at all with the content of this book. A few other books exist that offer "overviews" of Chilean wildlife, but these are not at all comprehensive. In brief, the book has no competition, either in print or out of print.
Few countries have a handbook so robust, and I can't think of any similar volume that's as portable, with the possible exception of much smaller areas such as the Galapagos. I know that I will certainly take this book with me on my next trip to Chile.
A Wildlife Guide to Chile: Continental Chile, Chilean Antarctica, Easter Island, Juan Fernandez Archipelago
 Fine general fieldguide with a broad scope August 8, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This is not a specialized guide book, though birds predominate. But I particularly like the much wider spectrum this book offers. There are no range maps, and it took me a while to get to grips with the range info. But basically, range is indicated by using the administrative regions shown on page 3 of the book. Species pictured are mostly digital cutouts from photographs. This results in some odd outlines and in many missing claws in the reptiles, to just name the most often encountered drawbacks. Depending on the photos used, the quality of these illustrations varies, and their size as well. This variable picture quality is the reason why I have not given five stars. But the illustrations should serve very well for their main purpose; i.e. they are usually quite adequate for identifying the species. Photos, even in this form, however, rarely allow to illustrate all the plumages of the more variable bird species. Nevertheless, many species have flight pictures as well.
The book tries to cover the more common species of birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, and butterflies. The flora is treated according to the major habitats with a few rather conspicuous typical species. For the marine environment, some commercial fish, molluscs and crabs, as well as some marine algae are presented.
Generally, both English and Spanish, as well as the scientific names are given. Often, more names are mentioned as well, with at least some names in other languages. For those birds that are included, there is always a German name as well. The texts for the individual species vary considerably. But they are usually quite comprehensive for the birds and mammals.
As a birder, I would not want to take along only this book, but this guide has definitely enlarged my view of nature in Chile. And a special benefit is the inclusion of the outlying islands that belong to Chile. There is also a section on where to go for wildlife observations. The paperback version is quite compact and lightweight, and it is thus the perfect travel companion. But it's a fine book for preparing a trip or just to get an overview as well. Definitely worth getting if you have any interest in that area of the world.
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