Backyard Birds of Texas: How to Identify and Attract the Top 25 Birds

I loved this book to help me get started in bird watching. It has enough birds to be interesting and not too many to overwhelm the absolute beginner like me. Since I bought the book, I have already outgrown it and need a more comprehensive one. I would still recommend it for beginners. It was easy to navigate, it had a nice picture summary at the end to quickly identify which bird you might be seeing, and then it had a food chart in the middle. I don't know why I never gave bird watching a chance before, but this has become the most relaxing hobby for me. I never dreamed there were so many different kinds of beautiful birds in my backyard until I finally started to putting out food to attract them. Of course, I accept that I must put out food for the squirrels, too.

A gift for my daughter in law and purchased due to its unique arrangement of birds by color. This makes finding the unknown birds much easier than in other bird identification books. A added bonus is that the opposite gender is also pictured on the page with the more boldly colored bird, usually the male, but not always. I do wish that the newer edition had notches on the side pages in addition to the colored portions to make reaching desired section even faster.

This book is a very simple, easy to read, and informative basic information suitable for any age of Beginners in the wonderful world of Birding and behaviors, habitats, and covers most everything from nesting, feeder platforms, and types of food they eat. Photos and text are on plain paper, not glossy paper, but sturdy enough for its' type. It cost around $5 so I feel comfortable loaning it to someone who is interested, but not risking a favorite and/or more expensive book for my backyard viewing hobby. I wanted to see a photo of the black-chinned hummingbird, but oddly, it was missing from this book, but I've seen them at my feeder here in San Diego coastal area. If that had been included it would have been perfect for hummingbird lovers California. It would be nice if they had included the year around birds (Gray-crowned Rosy Finch) located on Mt. Whitney, CA, although very few have ever seen them because it is over 14,000 feet high and their habitat is alpine and not as accessible. I dropped a 1/2 star for that and for not including all of the hummingbirds seen in California. The price point is well worth the investment of this little paperback so added another 1/2 star back for a 5 star! Hope this helps you decide if this is the right book for your library. Please let me know by checking the box below. Thanks!

This book did not give much information! I was surprise do to see the Starling shown in.. I think female only or? as they are black. Not enough detail on gender differences of a bird nor the details of the young as each is very different. I would choose a more detailed book, this was useless for us. Just did not provide enough information to give proper descriptions of any value. Not enough pictures!

This is a good beginner’s guide with really lovely photos of each bird. I was disappointed, however, that more species weren’t covered. I would have thought the warblers and cedar waxwings, for example, would’ve been included in a guide to Texas birds. We’ve also seen ravens and hawks in our yard, and none of the larger birds of prey are in there either. It’s a pretty small book (25 species) for $10. I will likely keep this for my 7 year old and find myself something more extensive.

not particularly useful - wanted it so my grandkids could identify bird around the feeder, but ...

Not a single bird in this book was in my backyard in Orange County.

Very limited number of birds included. Can't find any of my local birds in it. Swallows, finches, black birds, hawks, some I don't know and was hoping to learn.