Fish and Marine creatures ID books

TimG · January 14

Guys

If you have recommendations on good ID books to cover fish, reef creatures, corals, nudis etc, post them here and we'll compile a list which is pinned.

BOOK LIST

EUROPE

Blennies of the Mediterranean Sea: Biology and identification of Blenniidae Clinidae Tripterygiidae (Francesco Tiralongo)

Fauna und Flora of the Mediterranean/Mittelmeeres (Riedel) - available in Spanish, Italian and German

Nudibranchs of Britain,Ireland and Northwest Europe by Bernard Picton and Christina Morrow

MIDDLE EAST/GULF/RED SEA

Coastal Fishes of Oman (Randall JE)

Red Sea Reef Guide (Helmut Debelius)

Coral Reef Guide, Red Sea. (Lieske/Myers) A bit dated, but has some good descriptions of organisms, and covers mammals, fish, and invertebrates.

Red Sea Marine Life. (Andrey Ryanskiy) Names and pictures only, but contains some unusual and newly identified species. Digital copies also available from https://reefidbooks.com/

Reef Fishes of the East Indies, Vol 1-3 (Allen/Erdmann)

Marine life of the Pacific Northwest (Lamb/Hanby)

Coastal Fishes of the Western Indian Ocean https://saiab.ac.za/publications/coastal-fishes-of-the-western-indian/

SOUTH EAST ASIA

A diver's guide to Underwater Malaysia - Macrolife (Ferrari)

A diver's guide to Underwater Malaysia - Reef Life (Ferrari)

PACIFIC

Reef Fish Identification - Tropical Pacific (Allen/Steene/Humann/Deloach)

Reef Creature Identification Tropical Pacific (Humann / DeLoach)

Nudibranch & Sea Slug Identification Indo-Pacific (Gosliner/Valdes/Behrens)

Reef and Shore Fishes of the South Pacific (Randall JE)

Fishes of the Great Barrier Reef and Coral Sea (Randall/Allen/Steene)

Guide to the Sea Fishes of Australia (Kuiter)

Micronesian Reef Fishes (Myers RF)

Shore Fishes of Hawai'i (Randall JE)

Coastal Fishes of the Pacific Northwest (Lamb/Edgell)

CARIBBEAN

Reef Fish Identification - Florida, Caribbean, Bahamas (Humann/Deloach)

Reef Creature Identification - Florida, Caribbean, Bahamas (Paul Humann)

Reef Coral Identification - Florida, Caribbean, Bahamas (Paula Humann)

Caribbean Reef Life (Mickey Charteris)

GENERAL

Whelks to Whales (Rick Harbo)

Cardinalfilshes of the World (Rudie Kuiter & Toshikazu Kozawa)

APPS LIST

Fishes of the east Pacific : https://apps.apple.com/us/app/fishes-east-pacific/id494644648

WEB SITES

Corals of the World Information, identification, distribution and taxonomy of reef building corals

Chris Ross · January 15

Nudibranch & Sea Slug Identification Indo-Pacific (Gosliner, Valdes & Behrens) NSSI for short.

Reef Creature Identification Tropical Pacific (Humann / DeLoach)

Guide to the Sea Fishes of Australia (Kuiter)

Should the thread title perhaps be "Fish & all other Marine creatures ID books"

JS1221 · January 15

Caribbean Reef Life by Mickey Charteris

ianmarsh · January 15

Reef and Shore Fishes of the South Pacific (Randall JE)

Fishes of the Great Barrier Reef and Coral Sea (Randall JE, Allen GR, Steene RC)

Coastal Fishes of Oman (Randall JE)

Shore Fishes of Hawai'i (Randall JE)

Reef Fishes of the East Indies, Vol 1-3 (Allen GR, Erdmann MV)

Micronesian Reef Fishes (Myers RF)

Edited January 15 by ianmarsh

Bronson FE · January 15

Marine life of the Pacific Northwest

by Andy Lamb & Bernard P Hanby

Coastal Fishes of the Pacific Northwest

by Andy Lamb & Phil Edgell

Whelks to Whales

by Rick M Harbo

TimG · January 15

6 hours ago, Chris Ross said:

Should the thread title perhaps be "Fish & all other Marine creatures ID books"

It should indeed, Chris - thanks. I've not yet figured out though how to amend a thread title! I'll sort it out.

Thanks for these. I'll add them.

Architeuthis · January 15

Gold standard for Mediterranian, especially Adria, at scientific level. Unfortunately German only (Italian and Spanish translations exist):

Riedl R., ed. (1983) Fauna und Flora des Mittelmeeres. Paul Parey, Hamburg/Berlin. (2011 new edition by Seifert)

Spanish: Riedl R. (1986) Fauna y flora del mar mediterráneo: Una guía sistemática para biólogos y naturalistas. Ediciones Omega, Barcelona.

Italian: Riedl R. (1991) Fauna e flora del Mediterraneo – dalle alghe ai mammiferi: una guida sistematica alle specie che vivono nel mar Mediterraneo. Muzzio, Padova.

Edited January 15 by Architeuthis

Davide DB · January 15

7 minutes ago, Architeuthis said:

Gold standard for Mediterranian, especially Adria, at scientific level. Unfortunately German only (Italian and Spanish translations exist):

Riedl R., ed. (1983) Fauna und Flora des Mittelmeeres. Paul Parey, Hamburg/Berlin. (2011 new edition by Seifert)

Spanish: Riedl R. (1986) Fauna y flora del mar mediterráneo: Una guía sistemática para biólogos y naturalistas. Ediciones Omega, Barcelona.

Italian: Riedl R. (1991) Fauna e flora del Mediterraneo – dalle alghe ai mammiferi: una guida sistematica alle specie che vivono nel mar Mediterraneo. Muzzio, Padova.

I own that but it's really an outdated book with drawings and no pictures.

I have a long list of latest books for Mediterranean species. All the collection from Egidio Trainito is exceptional with one or more photos for each species. But they are only in Italian so i would not add them to this list.

Davide DB · January 15

IMHO this is the best for divers in the Med. But as i wrote it's in Italian only.

https://www.nhbs.com/atlante-di-flora-fauna-del-mediterraneo-atlas-of-flora-fauna-of-the-mediterranean-book

Davide DB · January 15

I was thinking that if the book worths mention, we could add a note on the language.

For example I see this book on Nudibranchs (always by Egidio Trainito):

https://opistobranquis.info/en/recursos/llibres-recomanats/nudibranchi-del-mediterraneo/

Nudibranchi del Mediterraneo by Egidio Trainito and Mauro Doneddu

This book becomes the “de facto” bible about the Mediterranean nudibranchs. The authors, Egidio Trainito and Mauro Doneddu, have surpassed themselves on this occasion. This work contains all species of opisthobranch molluscs observed to date in the Mediterranean Sea, with interesting descriptions and lots of great colour pictures.

This book, written in Italian, consists of an introduction to the opisthobranchs and its classification. The systematics have been updated from the first edition of 2005, so some species names have changed. Then comes a descriptive part with the records of 363 species, profusely illustrated with 650 excellent original photos made by the best underwater photographers in the Mediterranean.

Trainito and Doneddu demostrate, once again, that the discovery of new species is still possible, even in a sea so heavily studied as the Mediterranean Sea. In this book a new species associated with the habitat of the red coral (Corallium rubrum) is described, the Tritonia coralliumrubri.

If the first edition of 2005 was complete, this second edition is almost unbeatable. An ideal reference work for all nature-lovers, divers and marine biologysts; absolutely essential in your library.

JustinO · January 15

Coral Reef Guide, Red Sea. Lieske and Myers, 2004. A bit dated, but has some good descriptions of organisms, and covers mammals, fish, and invertebrates.

Red Sea Marine Life. Andrey Ryanskiy, 2022. Names and pictures only, but contains some unusual and newly identified species. Digital copies also available from https://reefidbooks.com/

Architeuthis · January 15

5 hours ago, Davide DB said:

I own that but it's really an outdated book with drawings and no pictures.

I have a long list of latest books for Mediterranean species. All the collection from Egidio Trainito is exceptional with one or more photos for each species. But they are only in Italian so i would not add them to this list.

I think that at this level one cannot say a book is outdated. It lacks photos, so the entertainment value may be smaller compared to modern books, but the >3000 drawings work out differences between species more striking than photos ever can. With > 2000 species it is the most comprehensive single book that I know (the Italian Atlas covers 1300 species with >2200 photos)...

Good that you mention the lack of photos, then nobody will be disappointed upon ordering...

Wolfgang

Edited January 15 by Architeuthis

Davide DB · February 7

I see that Paul Humann is mentioned several times in our list of books for identifying sea creatures.

Sadly, Paul Humann left us a few days ago.

R.I.P.

https://www.reef.org/remembering-paul-humann

TimG · February 7

Oh wow, I hadn’t heard that. An amazing guy. He’s done so much for marine conservation through fish ID etc. RIP indeed.

Griffer · March 12

Hi guys a good ID book for you too pin.

Nudibranchs of Britain,Ireland and Northwest Europe .A new book by Bernard Picton and Christina Morrow

Biodives · March 18

Reef Fishes of the East Indies (Allen & Erdmann) has been mentioned before as a 3 volume book set. But you can also get it in digital form as an app for iOS and Android, and for macs with Apple silicon CPU. I use it on a Macbook where it occasionally crashes but is still my favorite travel resource. You can download one of the 3 volumes for free and if you like it, which I expect you will, you can buy the other two for US$18 each.

https://www.reeffishesoftheeastindies.com/

If you were thinking to get the actual books then perhaps hold off because the second edition is at the printer. Hundreds more species have been added, some of them described in the appendix of volume 3, names updated and geographic distributions adjusted based on new data. Unfortunately I don't think an electronic version will accompany the books, at least not immediately.

Biodives · March 18

For cardinalfishes the best resource is Cardinalfishes of the World released in 2019 by (Rudie) Kuiter and Kozawa. There is a printed version but you can also download it for free as a PDF. One place to get a copy is via the link below.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335777894_ApogonidaeFishesLRs

Biodives · March 18

Another authorative and comprehensive free electronic resource is Coastal Fishes of the Western Indian Ocean. It is written by and for researchers but it is great for serious fish lovers and much more up to date than for instance the standard Red Sea fish ID books. And did I mention it is free 🙂

https://saiab.ac.za/publications/coastal-fishes-of-the-western-indian/

Kraken de Mabini · April 9

Here are some useful books on the marine life one becomes part of when diving:

Reef Fish Identification - Tropical Pacific by Allen G, Steene R, Humann P and DeLoach, N

Asia Pacific Reef Guide by Debelius, Helmut

Beneath Cornish Seas by Webster, Mark

Diving the Palos Verdes Peninsula (California) by Garner, Phil

Field Guide to Marine Fishes of Tropical Australia and South-East Asia by Allen, GR.

Nudibranch & Sea Slug Identificartion - Indo-Pacific by Gosliner TM, Valdes A & Behrens, DW

Nudibranch and Sea Snails - Indo-Pacific Guide by Debelius H.

Nudibranchs Encyclopedia by Coleman, Neville

Nudibranch Behavior by Behrens, DW, Pertrinos C, & Schrurs C.

Coral Reef Animals of the Indo-Pacific by Gosliner,TM; Behrens, DW & Williams, GC

Crustacea Guide of the World by Debelius, H.

- Most of these books display the photos of many marine photographers, from all over the world, and are the fruit of countless hours of hard work. I stand in awe of the incredible labor of love by the author-editors, and of the international cooperation by the underwater photographers whose photos made these books possible. -

Edited April 9 by Kraken de Mabini

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