Field Guides
Birds
Peterson Field Guide: Eastern Birds
National Geographic Society's Field Guide to the Birds of North America
Stokes Field Guide to Birds: Eastern Region
The Sibley Guide to Birds
Peterson Natural History Companions: Lives of North American Birds, Kenn Kaufman
Trees
Peterson Field Guide: Eastern Trees
Master Tree Finder, Mary Theilgaard Watts
Trees of the Eastern and Central United States and Canada, Harlow
The Sibley Guide to Trees
Wildflowers
Peterson Field Guide: Wildflowers
Peterson First Guide: First Guide to Wildflowers
Newcomb's Wildflower Guide
Weeds in Winter, Lauren Brown
Insects and Spiders
Peterson First Guide: First Guide to Butterflies and Moths
Peterson First Guide: First Guide to Caterpillars
Butterflies through Binoculars, Jeffrey Glassberg
Golden Guide to Insects
Golden Guide to Spiders and their Kin
Mammals
Stokes Nature Guide: Guide to Animal Tracking and Behavior
Peterson Field Guide: Mammals
Peterson First Guide: First Guide to Urban Wildlife
Reptiles and Amphibians
Audubon Guide Series Reptiles and Amphibians
Fish
Peterson Field Guide: Freshwater Fishes
Other Field Guides
Golden Guide to Pond Life
Fern Finder, Hallowell
Golden Guide to Non-Flowering Plants
The Roger Tory Peterson Field Guide Series is a classic series of reference books available in most bookstores. There is a Peterson Field Guide for almost everything, from clouds to beetles. In addition, there is now a series of Peterson First Guides that are very reasonably priced ($5 range) and contain only the most common plants or animals. These are ideal for use with children and are great for adults too.
Similar to the Peterson First Guides series, Donald and Lillian Stokes offer a series of Stokes Beginner's Guides. The Stokes Field Guide to Birds is great for the purposes of bird identification, but there is also a natural history series by the Stokes. The Stokes Series of Nature Guides are excellent, readable and contain fascinating descriptions of the northeastern United States' natural history. They are nice, inexpensive, all-around guides to nature. The Stokes Series of Nature Guides include guides to:
- Nature in Winter
- Common Bird Behavior
- Animal Tracking and Behavior
- Insect Lives
- Wildflowers
The Finder series are small pocket-sized identification guides that are handy for field work. Just because they're small, though, doesn't mean they are easy; they are well-constructed identification keys without too much terminology.
This is not, by any means, a complete list of field guides out there. Also, just because you may find a particular guide listed here does not mean that the NYSDEC promotes or endorses the use of the field guide. This is just a list of some of the field guides available for use.
