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A Field Guide to Coastal Fishes
FROM MAINE TO TEXAS
By Val Kells and Kent Carpenter
This is the first comprehensive field guide to the marine and brackish water fishes of the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts to be published in more than 24 years. And, it is the first of its kind to be completely illustrated in full color.
It is current, accurate, and designed for ease-of-use. It will be an important research and identification tool in libraries and laboratories.
In the field, it is sized to fit inside the tackle-box, center console, dive bag, tote, or back-pack.
This book is bound to become an invaluable resource for any body with an interest in fishes.
If you are a fisherman, diver, student, scientist, naturalist, or fish enthusiast... this book is for you.
If you’ve seen or caught a fish anywhere along the coast from Maine to Texas, from shallow inshore bays to offshore depths of about 660 feet, it is most likely identified here.
The Illustrator
Val Kells is a widely recognized freelance Marine Science Illustrator. She completed her formal training in scientific communication and illustration at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Since then, she has worked with designers, educators, and curators to produce a wide variety of illustrations for educational and interpretive displays in numerous public aquariums, museums, and nature centers.
Her artwork has been displayed at the North Carolina Aquariums, Texas State Aquarium, Long Beach Aquarium, and Monterey Bay Aquarium, among others. Her work has also been published in many books and periodicals. She most recently contributed to Sea Turtles - A Complete Guide to Their Biology, Behavior, and Conservation, and is currently completing the illustrations for Field Guide to Fishes of Chesapeake Bay.
Val is an avid fisherman and naturalist. She lives in Virginia with her family and spends her off time exploring and fishing the aquatic habitats of the Coast.
The Ichthyologist
Kent Carpenter is a well known Ichthyologist and Professor in Biological Sciences at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia. He completed his graduate studies at the University of Hawaii, Manoa and studied fishes overseas for over 20 years in the Philippines, Thailand, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Italy.
He is the author of numerous scientific articles on fishes and wrote and edited identification guides for fishery purposes for the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, including The Living Marine Resources of the Western Central Atlantic. His current work concentrates on evolution of fishes and marine conservation and currently he is the Director of the Global Marine Species Assessment for the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Conservation International.
Kent is an enthusiastic SCUBA diver and lives with his family in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
The Details
The book opens with the Introductory Chapter that includes a range map and explains the area of coverage, names, and presentation. Information about the diversity, classification, and adaptations of fishes is also included here. Six pages are exclusively devoted to the identification of fishes, and include helpful diagrams.
The Family Chapter follows. This chapter outlines the similarities of the fishes within each of 180 families that occur along the coast from Maine to Texas.
The Species Chapter comprises the bulk of the book, and contains concise, accurate descriptions of the features, habitats, and biology of the individual species. Large, meticulous, full-color illustrations accompany each description. Many juveniles are included, as well as several newly described, and non-native species.
The book closes with a glossary of terms and index of common and scientific names. An on-line appendix is also available.
By the numbers:
5 years in production
5 1/2 X 8 1/2 inches in size
448 pages long
1,006 species descriptions
1,079 full-color illustrations
Available February 2011
ISBN 10: 0-8018-9838-2
ISBN 13: 978-0-8018-9838-9
Click on the link below to buy the field guide:
A Field Guide to Coastal Fishes: From Maine to Texas
For more information please visit:
Val's blog can be read at http://allthingsfish.blogspot.com
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