Hawks from every angle : how to identify raptors in flight /

Most birders are strongly attracted to raptors, in part for the challenge they present to one's identification skills. This book makes extensive use of photographs of hawks in flight to help readers understand how expert field birders successfully identify 22 species of North American hawks. Liguori (an independent scholar) is a recognized expert in raptor identification. True to the book's title, he provides numerous color and black-and-white photographs of each species at various angles in flight. The concise text explains just what characteristics, some often rather subtle, are used to separate closely similar species. Hawk identification in many cases is difficult, but this book does a splendid job of educating its readers as to the specific characteristics the experts use to make their identifications. An introductory chapter reviews raptor anatomy and migration patterns and discusses hawk-watching and hawk-watching sites throughout the US. But the book's strength is its numerous crisp diagnostic photographs that, if diligently studied, should make readers competent to correctly identify virtually any hawk species. This book is a fine example of the sophistication of field identification in the study of birds. ^BSumming Up: Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates and general readers. J. C. Kricher Wheaton College (MA)