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This is a list of some of the books that I think every person seriously interested in seeing North American reptiles and amphibians needs to have in order to appropriately find, identify, and enjoy them. There are certainly many other books that can help expand this interest but these are the basics. Field guides of course are the most essential if you are a field oriented person, like myself. They naturally come first on my list since they are probably the cheapest, easiest to get, and the most useful for the average herper.

1. Peterson's Field Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians (Eastern and Central Region) List Price: $20

by Roger Conant and Joseph T. Collins 3rd Edition (1998) 616 pgs.

This book is essential for any one living in the central and eastern parts of the U.S. and Canada because it has excellent distribution maps on every species and subspecies of reptile and amphibian and has multiple ways of accurately figuring out which species you have caught or seen. Although most of its visual identification is done with plate drawings, they are very accurate and easy to understand. They also have quite a few photos thrown in along with habitat, range, similar species, identification, and other types of information. There distribution maps and the information they give to tell subspecies apart make this book phenomenal.

2. Peterson's Field Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians (Western Region) List Price: $20

by Robert C. Stebbins 3rd Edition (2003) 336 pgs.

This book is a great field guide for the western region. It is greatly advanced over the 2nd edition that I originally bought years ago. Now it is very good and comparable to the 3rd edition of the eastern/central Peterson's field guide. I used this guide in Arizona and California right after it came out and it worked great. This is the best book on the market for species identification of reptiles and amphibians over the entire west.

3. National Audubon Society Field Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians List Price: $19

by John L. Behler and F. Wayne King 17th printing (March 2000) 743 pgs.

I enjoy photographs (obviously) and this book has photos of most the species. This book is useful not only for one section of the U.S. and Canada but of the entirety of North America north of Mexico. The Audubon guides are known for their accurate scientific photography which I like and they also have decent descriptive pages on species. However, they don't have a lot of information on subspecies and verbally tell you where the borders for individual subspecies are located. Their distribution maps need quite a bit of work. I use other sources to find out more about the herps, proper distribution maps, and subspecies information. I recommend this book for a general guide but probably not the first book on the shelf I would grab for identification. Can be better for you to study your herps though because you can look at pictures instead of plates.

4. Snakes of North America: Eastern and Central Region List Price: $30

by Alan Tennant (November 2003) 588 pgs. soon to be 614 pgs.

The "Snakes of North America" field guides by Alan Tennant are excellent. They also have detailed descriptions of each species along with extra sections for each subspecies. They have all the information that you will probably need to identify any snake you come in contact with. They have excellent distribution maps but no plate drawings. The photographs they have cover not only every species but most subspecies in the U.S. It is just over 600 pages and is well worth the $30 price tag.

5. A Field Guide to the Snakes of North America: Western Region List Price: $25

by Alan Tennant and Richard D. Bartlett (October 1999) 312 pgs.

This is the book I used the most while in the west. This book helped me catch the Rocky Mountain Rubber Boa and gave me valuable information I needed during many field trips.

Robert Jadin's Herpetology Journal

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