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Handbook of the Mammals of the World

Discussion in 'TV, Movies, Books about Zoos & Wildlife' started by Hix, 7 Jan 2009.

  1. Okapipako

    Okapipako Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    @PossumRoach Before yours arrived, did you see or receive any updates on the shipment status? I'm also in the US and pre-ordered back in August, and mine is still listed as Pre-Shipment in Staten Island NY - this status hasn't changed since November.
     
  2. PossumRoach

    PossumRoach Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    It should have changed status after December 13. Idk how many bulks Lynx sent to the US.
     
  3. toothlessjaws

    toothlessjaws Well-Known Member

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    My copy of the illustrated checklist just arrived. I do not regret buying this at all and the new primate artwork is a huge improvement. I do have a few gripes though:

    - Thin paper. I get why. but still, don't like it.

    - The omission of recently extinct taxa. There is not that many species of known appearance that it would have significantly blown out the page count. This I think was a big mistake

    - The omission of the dromedary. If excluding recently extinct species was a big mistake then this was a ridiculous one. I don't think domestic "species" should be included if their wild ancestor is, but when the wild type is extinct and the domestic version is essentially the same animal, then this is just logic thrown out for the sake of silly, self imposed rules.

    - And all this comes at the expense of some species (some dubious new splits) that are clearly indistinguishable in painted form, yet have half a dozen identical paintings depicting them.

    - There are a few lousy paintings in there for rather high profile mammals. The elephants are a good example. The forest and savanna African elephant illustrations don't even successfully capture the true (and very obvious) differences in the two species for example.

    - Lastly, and this goes for HMW as well, I don't really much see the point in illustrating say, all the subspecies of leopard if you are going to a)lack the detail in the artwork that is required to differentiate them and b)radically change the posing of the examples so that the differences are hard to distinguish. As much as the primate art in the HMW was poorly rendered, the consistency of posing for all the types of a single genus or family was a much better formula that some of the other artists work.


    A great resource, but there is definitely room for an updated edition.
     
  4. Carlos M

    Carlos M Well-Known Member

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    I finally have my copy of the Illustrated Checklist after long weeks of waiting. At last, I can say that I’m mostly happy with the books. It’s such a delight to browse through the pages and see all the amazing diversity of mammals. It’s a great piece of both art and science together. After a first glance at its content, I have some thoughts about the book:

    1) I really like the design of the book. Putting the illustrations over a white background makes it more comfortable to observe, contrary to a gray color as in the handbook series. Also, adding some species on both sides of the spreading pages (and not only on the right page), makes it more visually appealing in my opinion.

    2) I really appreciate how some taxonomic notes on certain species discuss some very recent splits occurring while the book was in its final stages of production (ej. as in Petaurus breviceps), even though it doesn’t include illustrations (which I found understandable, as it would mean a last minute change in the overall design and layout of some parts of both books). On the same note, it's great to see some minor last minute updates, such as changing the status of the Common Hamster from Least Concern to Critically Endangered (as compared to the sample pages on their website).

    3) The prosimians, old world monkeys, gibbons and great apes illustrations are a really great improvement compared to the original illustrations used in the handbook. I would have preferred to see the prosimians as the gibbons and orangutans, with no branches with them, but overall they are equally a joy to see. I have to say that, sadly, new world monkeys illustrations are not as improved as the rest of the primates: they used the old marmosets and tamarins illustrations with the exceptions of three species and a lot of the rest of the families are depicted in the same position (most notably in most of the howler monkeys). Why did they keep the marmosets and tamarins illustrations? In their exhibition catalogue they showed a Common marmoset illustration with a great quality, but they didn’t use it in the final checklist. I just would have wished that they were depicted just as good as the old world monkeys, but sadly it wasn’t the case.

    4) New world monkeys aside, I have some problems with certain illustrations. Some of them are of very small size, even though there is enough blank space left in the page. Other illustrations have a low resolution. And a lot, if not most of the illustrations for the new species added since the handbook, are a mix of already existing illustrations with minor changes (as in the genus Leopardus) or just the same illustrations with different color (the most extreme example is the Common Tapeti and all its new subspecies depicted).

    5) I still would have wished they added illustrations for both the domestic species and the extinct ones. Practically, most of the species in the camel family are not depicted since most of them are domesticated. And well, omitting cattle at all (both the extant domesticated species and the extinct wild one) is sad. I know that a lot of the extinct species could not be depicted because of a lack of complete specimens (as the giant lemurs, the sardinian pika and the nesophontes), but it would have been a great addition to include at least the ones where we know how they looked like (aurochs, wild horse, thylacine and other marsupials, and the Steller’s Sea Cow I think).

    After all, it’s a really great book and an extraordinarily nice conclusion to the mammal series started more than a decade ago, with some opportunities for improvement in the future.
     
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  5. PossumRoach

    PossumRoach Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    Indeed. Personally, I did not like how the Aotids seemed to be drawn by different artists having the monkeys be drawn in different positions and painted using different styles.
     
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  6. UplU

    UplU Member

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    Hi

    Whoever has the illustrated checklist, I have a couple of questions regarding the orangutan plate :

    - Did the artist depict the female of any species ?

    - Are other subspecies of Pongo pygmaeus illustrated alongside the nominate subspecies ?

    - How do you rate the quality of the illustrations of this particular species compared to the original artwork in HMW 3 ?

    Thank you.
     
  7. TeaLovingDave

    TeaLovingDave Moderator Staff Member 10+ year member

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    1) Females are depicted for all three species.
    2) No.
    3) Definitely a MASSIVE improvement for both of the species illustrated in the original volume (tapanuliensis having been described too recently for inclusion in HMW3)

    Compare and contrast:

    IMG_20210207_062618233.jpg

    IMG_20210207_062646672.jpg
     
    Last edited: 7 Feb 2021
  8. PossumRoach

    PossumRoach Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    I am aware that Dave already posted the picture of the page but the store page does have a picture that lacks the light reflection Dave's picture has.

    [​IMG]
     
  9. PossumRoach

    PossumRoach Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    Has anyone else realized the error on pages 308 and 309 in volume 2 of the illustrated checklist?
     
  10. Tetzoo Quizzer

    Tetzoo Quizzer Well-Known Member

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    It isn’t obvious to me...
     
  11. PossumRoach

    PossumRoach Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    While the southern Muntiacus muntjak is listed as number 12 on the species account, The animal listed as M muntjak is labeled as number 13 on the image plate and has the distribution map of Muntiacus vaginalis. Vice versa could be said about Muntiacus vaginalis.
     
    Last edited: 5 Mar 2021
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  12. Tetzoo Quizzer

    Tetzoo Quizzer Well-Known Member

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    Aah! Thanks!
     
  13. twilighter

    twilighter Well-Known Member 10+ year member

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    Good point @PossumRoach. I personally regret that they didn't include the common name next to the scientific name on the illustration, like in the Illustrated Checklist of the Birds of the World .
     
  14. PossumRoach

    PossumRoach Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    For those who didn’t see the news yet or check the “Lynx Edicions, what’s next?” yet, Lynx has announced the far more compressed “all the mammals of the world” and preorder is already available.

    All the Mammals of the World – Lynx Nature Books
     
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  15. AaronAntics

    AaronAntics Member

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    I'm really looking forward to this, it was announced the day after my birthday so I used my birthday money to immediately preorder it, along with the All the Birds of the World book. I previously had them all as the illustrated checklist, as I preferred the consistency across volumes. But now that the mammals have received the birds treatment all in one volume, I will get these instead. This means that my mammals and birds checklists are now up for sale, if anyone's interested.

    I'm particularly looking forward to seeing if they've gone back on the Groves and Grubb bovine taxonomy as that was my main gripe with the mammals checklist. Something tells me they won't though. Unfortunately the folks at Lynx Edicions are splitters as opposed to lumpers.

    Anyone else surprised they went with a snow leopard for the cover instead of a lynx?
     
  16. PossumRoach

    PossumRoach Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    A lynx would seem repetitive since it is what they used for the handbook of the mammal species of the world volume 1. The booms would look very similar.
     
  17. AaronAntics

    AaronAntics Member

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    This does lead me to wonder whether the new book will divorce itself from the handbooks. I really hope so, as I feel like they're clinging to Grove and Grubbs for consistency's sake. Does anyone know if All the World's Birds refers to the handbooks and illustrated checklists?
     
  18. joe99

    joe99 Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    I have both, and they do somewhat, along with also having QR codes that lead to the site HBW alive, which I recommend as it a great source of information and is updated with taxonomy and species accounts quite often
     
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  19. AaronAntics

    AaronAntics Member

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    Is there an equivalent site for the mammals? I'm registered to the bird one.
     
  20. joe99

    joe99 Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    Not for the mammals, but ASM Mammal Diversity Database is the best reference for taxonomy
    ASM Mammal Diversity Database