With over 1800 species, Peru has the second richest avifauna of any country in the world. As a consequence it is one of the most popular birding destinations in South America.
This is the first comprehensive and fully illustrated field guide to the birds of Peru. The text is arranged opposite the plates, in conventional field guide manner. Each species account includes a distribution map, distribution, abundance, length, elevation, habitat, behaviour, and extensive notes on vocalisations. English and scientific bird names are given. This is the 2010 reprint that features a few amendments and includes 3 new plates.
Foreword by Dr. Antonio Brack Egg 6
Preface 7
Acknowledgments 8
Introduction 12
How to Use This Book 12
Topography of Peru 18
Habitats of Peru 20
Glossary of Bird Topography 22
Molts and Plumages 26
Cautionary Note Regarding Seabird Identification 27
Conservation 27
Species Accounts 30
Vocal Credits 638
Vocal References 639
Artists' Credits 640
Index 641
Thomas S. Schulenberg and Douglas F. Stotz are ornithologists and conservation ecologists at the Field Museum in Chicago.
Daniel F. Lane and John P. O'Neill are illustrators and field ornithologists, and both are research associates at the Louisiana State University Museum of Natural Science. Lane also leads Field Guides birding tours.
Theodore A. Parker III, who worked throughout Peru before his death in 1993, was the premier neotropical field ornithologist of his time.
"[...] Birds of Peru is a field guide worthy of the country it covers. However, if you have no plans to bird in Peru or nearby regions and have no interest in neotropical birds, then you have no reason to get this field guide (if that’s you, why are you reading this?). Likewise, if you have the previous edition and aren’t planning to visit Peru anytime soon, then there is not a compelling reason to upgrade. But everyone else should have a copy of this commendable guide. And if you’re lucky enough to be birding in Peru, you’d be crazy not to have this with you."
- Grant McCreary (23-06-2010), read the full review at The Birder's Library
"[I]f any places needed a field guide, it was Peru, second only to Columbia as the most bird-rich country in the world [...] Now, 40 years after he first envisioned a field guide, [John] O'Neill and his principal co-authors, Tom Schulenberg and Doug Stotz, have finally completed the guide against which all others for the New World tropics will be judged [...] The Birds of Peru's nearly 4 000 color illustrations alone – more than double that of any other single-country neotropics guide – set it apart [...] [It] is the culmination of an incredible amount of fieldwork, but that doesn't mean the exploration is finished [...] This book isn't the end; it's really the beginning"
- Don Stap, Audubon Magazine