Coral Reef Fishes: Indo-Pacific and Caribbean

I own 3 copies of the book (two of the second edition, one of the first) because I would fear the day that they would stop printing it. As an avid diver, research scientist, and conservation biologist, I am frequently diving around the world such as in Belize, Honduras, Panama, St. Lucia, Madagascar, Egypt, Sulawesi, Maldives, among other sites. I have never found a better or more accurate field guide as the ones that they have prepared that is useful in all of these sites, and provides such stunning and accurate illustrations that allow for easy identifications of very similar species. I strongly recommend buying this book!

I bought this book since I am a volunteer at the Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta, Georgia. This book is a tremendous resouce especially in the Tropical Diver Exhibit which has many species of tropical fish. It is helpful in identification and lists the fish by scientific as well as common names. I would highly recommend this guide for fish identification, and many of the volunteers use this guide as their resource as well.

I bought the book because i need the names of the fishes in the caribbean, where i dive now, and i thinks that it is a very nice book, very usefull and with a low price.

An amazingly well done flied guide useful for even advanced fish enthusiasts and scuba divers. I have used this book on dive trips to the Egyptian red sea, the sea of Cortez in Mexico and to Cuba, as well as while walking trough several aquariums in the US, and I have hardly ever failed to find a tropical fish species I observed in this book. The illustrations are well done and include juveniles, sex differences and regional color variants. In addition to the geographic range of a species, the likely occurrence on the reef (lagoon, outward reef, sand ...), the depth ranges and information about fish behavior are indicated. I have found this additional information extremely useful, especially when trying to identify one of several similar species. The book is divided into a Indopacific and a Carribean part, and in addition to the species descriptions there is a short general introduction to corral reefs and fish biology.

You'll appreciate this guide whether you're a curious amateur or serious naturalist. It's got one of the most exhaustive coverages of each of the families of fish. Sure it misses out one or two species for some families, but it's hard to have a complete guide to the reef - it's too diverse. It has one of the most complete guides to cartilaginous fish, pipefish, butterfly fish, groupers, damsels and wrasses, as far as I am aware, but it certainly has the most complete guide to gobies. Colours for some species may be a little bit inaccurate, but then again, everything looks different in or out of water, and varies with visibility and health. It's not that big an issue. Something else that's handy: pointers on the slate that highlight distinctive markings. A good buy. You'd want to waterproof this.