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The brief reviews that follow are entirely my own opinions. They are based on what
I consider to be the quality of the information about birds and birding in
the books. Pretty pictures and cute stories about birds are nice,
but that's not what the reviews are about. You can find most of these books
at the Hamilton County Public Library,
so you can check them out before you buy them. Books about the birds of a local
area tend to go out of print fairly quickly, so you may need to search used book stores,
or hunt on the internet, if you want to buy several of these books.
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Bird Finding Guides. The emphasis is on where to go
birding, but there is usually additional information about the birds themselves.
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Monographs. Descriptions by species of the birds
which can be found in a region, with information on such topics as current
or historical status, distribution, numbers, migration dates, habitats, etc.
There may also be information on where to find the birds.
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Breeding Bird Atlases. A presentation of the results
of multi-year studies of what species of birds breed in a state.
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Road Atlases. If you're content to bird only on
field trips, where someone else leads you from bird to bird, you won't need
an atlas. Unless, of course, you somehow become separated from the group,
and find yourself off in a corn field somewhere . . .
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Birding in Ohio. Tom Thomson. Indiana University Press, 1994. Generally
good descriptions of places to bird. Some of the directions to the places
are inaccurate; you will want to have a good atlas if you use this to go
exploring. Also, I miss having an index to the birds; it's too hard to find
all the places that a looked-for species is mentioned. With those caveats,
I would still recommend this book.
Indiana Birds and Their Haunts. Charles E. Keller, Shirley A. Keller,
and Timothy C. Keller (none of whom are related to me). Indiana University
Press, 1986. This book is divided about equally between descriptions of places
to bird and descriptions of the status of the species found in Indiana, including
dates. The information is this slim volume is terse, but quite useful.
The Birds of Dayton. Ornithological Committee of the Dayton Audubon Society.
Landfall Press, 1984. This small book has some very good information both about the
birds and about birding sites. Dayton isn't very far away; the birds are nearly the
same, and Cincinnati birders often visit many of the places described. Get this book
instead of the next one.
A Birder's Guide to the Cincinnati Tristate. Robert Folzenlogen. Willow
Press, 1995. This is the best guide devoted specifically to finding birds near
Cincinnati, for the simple reason that it is the only guide devoted specifically
to finding birds near Cincinnati. It has a few good ideas for where to bird, and
will be useful for someone who is new to the area. You will outgrow it very quickly.
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The Birds of Ohio. Bruce G. Peterjohn. Indiana University Press, 1989.
An absolutely excellent reference to the status and distribution of Ohio's
birds. The wealth of information on migration timing is amazing. This book
may be too detailed, and too dry, for the casual birder; but if you are serious
about learning about our local birds, you should get this book. Expensive,
but well worth it.
Abundance and Distribution of the Birds of Ohio. Bruce G. Peterjohn,
Raymond L. Hannikman, Jean M. Hoffman, and Elliot J. Tramer. Ohio Biological
Survey, 1987. The light version of the preceding book. The bar charts (which
are not in the larger book) give a nice visual summary of when birds are
likely to be present.
The Birds of Indiana. Russell E. Mumford and Charles E. Keller. Indiana
University Press, 1984. The species descriptions tell you
very little. Indiana Birds and Their Haunts as much information about the
birds as this book, plus bird finding information; and it's a lot less expensive.
I would pass on this one.
The Birds of Kentucky. Burt L. Monroe, Jr. Indiana University Press,
1994. Better information than The Birds of Indiana, but does not approach
the quality of The Birds of Ohio. Save your money, and get the next book,
instead.
Annotated Checklist of the Birds of Kentucky. Burt L. Monroe, Jr.,
Anne L. Stamm, and Brainard L. Palmer-Ball, Jr. Commonwealth Printing Co.,
1988. Smaller and much less expensive than the preceding book, this one
contains about as much useful information, and has species bar charts to
boot.
The Birds of Kentucky. Robert M. Mengel. The American Ornithologists
Union, 1965. Although dated, there is plenty of detailed information about
the birds. There is more information here about subspecies than in any other
book reviewed on this page; enough, in fact, to justify buying it even if
you don't care about Kentucky, since much of the subspecies information will
hold true for adjoining states. There is also a good discussion of the different
regions of Kentucky.
Birds of the Oxbow. David Styer. C.J. Krehbiel Company, 1993. Covers
the Oxbow region of Indiana and Shawnee Lookout in Ohio. Written by one of
Cincinnati's best birders, this book presents both detailed information and
visually intuitive graphs of the abundance and migration timing of the birds
in these areas.
Birds of Southwestern Ohio. Emerson Kemsies and Worth Randle. Edwards
Brothers, 1953. Of chiefly historical interest today. You will be surprised
at how much things have changed since the 1950's. You can usually find a
used copy at Ohio Book Store, 726 Main Street. Worth made extensive
notes for a revised edition, which have been transcribed by
Earl Thirey.
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The Ohio Breeding Bird Atlas. Bruce G. Peterjohn and Daniel L. Rice.
Ohio Department of Natural Resources, 1991. Ohio's atlas project was conducted
from 1982 through 1987. Although not a bird finding guide, this book will
give you a very good general idea of where to look for breeding birds, and
what your chances of finding them are.
The Kentucky Breeding Bird Atlas. Brainard L. Palmer-Ball, Jr. The University
Press of Kentucky, 1996. Very similar in content and quality to the Ohio atlas.
Atlas of Breeding Birds of Indiana. John S. Castrale, Edward M. Hopkins and Charles E. Keller.
Indiana Department of Natural Resources, 1998. The Indiana version of the above.
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DeLorme Atlas and Gazetteer Series. DeLorme Mapping. Available for
Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky.
County Map Series. Thomas Publications. Available for Ohio, Indiana
and Kentucky.
Of the two, I greatly prefer DeLorme. The County Map series is in black and
white. Each county is depicted separately, which makes it difficult to follow
roads across county lines.
One alternative, if you have a laptop, would be to get one of the many CD-ROM
based atlases. With that and a GPS receiver in your car, you would never
be lost.
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