marine fish and invertebrates of northern europe

[Kate R]

i bought this book last week (while up in scapa - smug ), and when i got back i noticed it had been featured in dive(r?). i imagine a few people will be interested in it as there is a gap in the market for a top-quality marine life guide, so i thought i'd give YD the benefit of hearing my opinion....

this seems like a really, really good book, although i haven't been through all 600 pages thoroughly yet! of all the uk marine life books i have seen up till now, only two were pretty comprehensive - that one with the purple cover, which i really didn't like the format of, and paul naylor's great british marine animals, which is great, but quite limited in the number of species it covers as it goes into so much detail. this new book covers a huge number of species, has quite a lot of info on each one (sections on distribution, description, habitat and biology), and most importantly, top class photography, with at least one quality photo of each species.

it's also very up to date - the english edition only came out a couple of months ago, and it has small sections on things like the darwin mounds and other current issues. it also has little 'did-you-know' boxes, which i quite liked.

downsides - the book was written and originally published in norwegian, and so although it's about marine life of northern europe it does concentrate on scandinavian rather than uk species. also, it's quite pricey - £40. apart from that, it's great!

amazon link:http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/...775216-8054044

[John Gulliver]

The Norwegian version is a brilliant book and has been immensely popular among Scandinavian divers ever since the first edition (which had quite a lot of errors) was published. The photographs are absolutely fantastic. I don't think UK divers need be concerned about the fact that it originates from Scandinavia as it probably covers just about everything you are likely to see in UK waters as well as a whole lot of creatures that you are unlikely to see. The only problem for me is that there is no Swedish edition. A book with the Norwegian or English common names is of limited use when one lives in Sweden.

[Dr Stevil]

Originally Posted by Kate R

seems like of all the uk marine life books i have seen up till now, only two were pretty comprehensive - that one with the purple cover, which i really didn't like the format of

If that's the same one I'm thinking of, it's also reknowned for being chockfull or errors too, so I'd be interested in seeing this new book, cheers of the 'heads-up' Kate.

You back to doing office stuff for the RSPB now?
Cheers
Steve

[Kate R]

Originally Posted by Steve W

If that's the same one I'm thinking of, it's also reknowned for being chockfull or errors too, so I'd be interested in seeing this new book

yeah, that's the one. as i understand it, the errors aren't really that important -they mixed up the scientific names and pictures of some subspecies or something... it's just that someone gave the book a really snotty review on amazon so everyone heard about it!

Originally Posted by Steve W

cheers of the 'heads-up' Kate

If You Enjoyed This Post, A Donation Of A Green Blob Would Be Much Appreciated (due to absence, i have shame at the number of blobs relative to number of posts!)

Originally Posted by John Gulliver

it probably covers just about everything you are likely to see in UK waters

i noticed it didn't have tompot blenny (only yarrel's blenny), and i expect there will be other minor omissions, but i reckon it'll be great when used with paul naylor's book for the british angle. i guessed you might have heard of it!