Product Description

Most nature travellers to Southern Mexico-Cancœn and the Yucat‡n Peninsula, Oaxaca, Chiapas, Tabasco-want to experience tropical forests and other stunning habitats and catch glimpses of exotic wildlife: toucans and parrots, hummingbirds and hawks, monkeys and anteaters, frogs and toads, crocodiles and snakes. This book provides all the information you need to find, identify, and learn about the region's magnificent animal life.

- Identifying, location, ecological, and conservation information on the most frequently spotted animals.

- Color illustrations of about 550 of the most common fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals-the species you are most likely to see.

- Information on habitats of Southern Mexico and on the most common plants you will encounter.

- Information on the underwater animals most divers and snorkelers actually see.

- Brief descriptions of the region's most frequently visited parks and reserves.

Easy-to-carry, entertainingly written, beautifully illustrated-you will want to have this book as constant companion on your journey.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #709439 in Books
• Published on: 2006-08
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 487 pages

About the Author
Les Beletsky is a professional wildlife biologist and university zoology teacher. Prior to taking up writing wildlife guides, he conducted many years of field research on the ecology and behavior of birds. He is the author of numerous books, including Costa Rica, Belize, Ecuador, Peru, and Hawaii in this series.

Customer Reviews

A reference book rather than a portable guide
I have a couple of excellent portable regional field guides, such as the Audubon guide to the Southwest. While this book contains some good information it loses marks for lack of portability.

The book includes common amphibians & reptiles, birds, mammals and the coral reef. It has sections on the different habitats in the region and describes places to visit.

While I find this is useful to prepare for my trip I will not be using it as a field guide because it is bulkier than I had expected. It seems to have been designed more as an armchair reference: the paper is exceptionally heavyweight and there are essays on a range of ecological issues such as the exotic pet trade.

The art work for the birds is very beautiful and printed quite large. But other than very short descriptions on the bird's physical features, habitat and range, most of the information is on family profiles that give a general ecological overview rather than providing information about specific species.

The section on fishes and other inhabitants of the coral reef seems to be an excellent field guide: each description concisely describes what you will need to notice to identify the species and provides a few facts that will make observing it more interesting. If I decide to carry the book around on my trip it will be for the sake of this section.

Although the book was published in 2007, I think it is probably the same as the book 'Southern Mexico' published several years ago. At one point the text states "as of writing of this book, in 1998...'