Lynx and BirdLife International Field Guides

This project comes to life after years of conversations motivated by a shared idea between Lynx and BirdLife International that the existence of country field guides is a basic element for the “emergence” and education of birdwatchers, ornithologists, bird guides and naturalists in any given country, which, in turn, has important repercussions on the Conservation of Nature and Biodiversity, both locally and globally.

The principal goal of this new collection is to produce modern, standardized field guides, especially for countries without any recent or country-level guide. The main collection is produced in English, including local-language names for the species when an official list exists. But the publisher also has a secondary goal of publishing a number of the titles in their local languages to enhance the local effects of the work.

The main authors are experts on the area covered by their field guide and they work closely with an experienced team of Lynx authors and editors for a final product that is both accurate and homogeneous. The illustrations are a vital part of any field guide, and this new collection contains illustrations from the Handbook of the Birds of the World series, as well as many additional figures prepared specifically for the guides. The coverage includes males and relevant females and morphs, as well as flying birds of prey, waterbirds and pigeons and doves, and a number of juvenile and non-breeding plumages. The distribution maps are produced from the geodatabase distribution data (digitized maps) compiled by BirdLife International and Lynx, which are then improved with local input from the authors. And for species with more than one subspecies in the region, the resident/breeding ranges of the separate subspecies are indicated on the map.

The field guides in the collection all follow the same design, in order to facilitate their use, and this homogeneity includes the taxonomy, which is that of the HBW and BirdLife International Illustrated Checklist of the Birds of the World. To give more attention to local taxa, all subspecies groups present in the region have full entries as well.