Reef Fishes Volume 1
by Scott W. Michael

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Book Summary Information

• Covering 68 families and thousands of species, Reef Fishes is an authoritative guide designed to be a lifelong reference for saltwater aquarists, divers, and amateur reef naturalists
• This volume covers coral reef habitats and fish families, with detailed information on major groups

Book Reviews of Reef Fishes Volume 1

Book Review: Beautifully written and produced; too hefty for travellers
Summary: 5 Stars

The three volumes in this set will each cover a different set of families. The first volume includes morays, toadfish, trumpetfish, scorpionfish, lionfish, anthias, and several others. The two future volumes will include the other major families, such as butterfly fish, angel fish, parrot fish, wrasses, and gobies. For divers and underwater photographers, as opposed to aquarists, buying just one volume of the set would not be enough. The first volume alone is over 500 pages, and is published in hard back, so these are designed to reside in your library rather than fit into your suitcase.

Pluses: The text is a pleasure to read. You can open this book at any page and find that you can't put it down. It puts the popular Indo Pacific Coral Reef Field Guide and the recently published Lieske and Myers guide to shame in this respect. It appears to be the most comprehensive coral reef fish book I've seen, with sections of about 15-20 pages each on scorpionfish or morays--far superior to any of the popular guides on the market. It has a scientific perspective and appears to be as much a marine biology text as it is a fish ID book. The chapter on coral reef ecology alone is better than the small Pisces book on that subject. The photos are outstanding, and the production quality is as high as any book I've seen in this category.

Minuses: This book is written firstly for the aquarist and secondly for the diver and photographer. This is reflected in the layout (the book is organized by fish family rather than geographically, which limits it's usefulness as a fish identification guide), in the content (sharks, rays, barracudas, and pelagic reef visitors are missing from the table of contents), and in the theme, which is focused on keeping reef fish in captivity as much as observing them in their natural habitat.

Overall, it's better than anything else out there. But if you want a portable fish ID book to take on dive trips, this isn't it.

Summary of Reef Fishes Volume 1

Fish & Sharks Books

• Books > Subjects > Science & Math > Biological Sciences > Animals