Iowa Bird Watching. A Year-Round Guide.
Bill Thompson, III and the Staff of Bird Watcher's Digest. 2005. Cool
Springs Press.
The first author notes that he is a native Iowan, but he’s not lived here for a
good while.
The first 25 pp are a good summary about birding in Iowa written by an Iowa birder, Diane Porter, who is credited in the text but who really should be credited as a coauthor. This section is one of the strengths of the book although her selection of Ten Must See birds puzzles me. There is a list of 10 birding sites, each with short paragraphs describing them. I feel this cuts Iowa rather short, as there are many more good places to bird in Iowa.
The remaining 135 pages are part of a cookbook series of State Bird Watching. So far, Thompson has published or has publication dates for books covering 29 states. I suspect he has a set of bird biographies --- drop in Baltimore Oriole and Blue Jay, drop out Bullock’s Oriole and Steller’s Jay, etc; while keeping the rest the same.
There are 100 birds, illustrated by small photos. I do not like field guides using photos, and to make it worse, they illustrate only one bird per species, and do not show sexual or seasonal variation. The text for each species includes: Habitat & Range, Food, Nesting & Incubation.
This book points you to Tom Kent’s website, where you can get an Iowa checklist, but one is not present in the book. It does not tell you how many birds are expected beyond the 100 birds in the species account section.
This book wastes space on a good deal of general bird information that I do not feel needs to be in a book of Iowa birding. The last 19 pages are very general and probably remain unchanged from state to state, with the exception of changing some plant suggestions, depending on region.
Thompson is the author of one really excellent book, Identify Yourself: The 50 Most Common Birding Identification Challenges.
--Rick Hollis--