A Field Guide to the Dinosaurs of North America: and Prehistoric Megafauna

While not as terrible as Moody's "Dinofile: Profiles of 120 Amazing, Terrifying and Bizarre Beasts" (which I'd give 0/5 stars if I could: https://www.amazon.com/review/R11QFC0SN4L2PA/ref=cm_cr_srp_d_rdp_perm?ie=UTF8 ), Strauss' "A Field Guide to the Dinosaurs of North America: and Prehistoric Megafauna" (henceforth FG) is still pretty terrible. The FG reviews of RaptorRex & Chronomorphosis sum up why. In this review, I point you to said reviews & add my own thoughts as well:-In reference to seeing for yourselves "how much credibility [About.com] establishes Strauss", don't bother.* I've already seen it for myself & it's more-or-less the same info as on FG's back cover.-If you want Krasovskiy's best work, get White's "Dinosaur Art II" (which even features his "Torvosaurus gurneyi" on the front cover). It's a bit shrink-wrapped, but otherwise very good to great. Unfortunately, FG only features his older work (which still looks good, but is outdated to varying degrees). You can see what I mean by comparing his older & newer work at his DeviantArt (Google "atrox1").-Speaking of DeviantArt, Krasovskiy's "featherless raptor with green scales" (I.e. "deinonychus (retro)") is there too. I'm surprised it isn't featured or linked to in RaptorRex's FG review.-In reference to FG pointlessly featuring "a few random mammoths", I'm glad RaptorRex criticized it. It's an annoyingly-common problem in dino books, even good ones like DK's "Where on Earth? Dinosaurs and Other Prehistoric Life".-Speaking of annoyingly-common problems in dino books, I'm glad Chronomorphosis criticized Strauss' "constant insistence on the lack of intelligence of long-extinct animals". Non-maniraptoran dinos were at least as intelligent as living reptiles (which are MUCH more intelligent than people like Strauss give them credit for).** 2 more noteworthy examples of FG's annoyingly-repetitive writing & inaccurate text are 1) the phrase "The fact is that..." (which is used 6 times in the introductory sections alone), & 2) the claims that Albertosaurus & Stegosaurus lived together (as opposed to 78+ million years apart).-As you may remember, there are 2 kinds of dino field guide ( https://www.amazon.com/review/R2DH2U4T7MNS0N/ref=cm_cr_srp_d_rdp_perm?ie=UTF8 ). FG can't decide which kind it is (E.g. Compare the Strauss quotes, which are from back-to-back sections). Either way, both Holtz/Brett-Surman 2015 & White 2015 are MUCH better books than FG (which is like reading Creepypastas: [Google "Old Man Reads Creepypastas | Phelous"] ).*What used to be "About.com" is now "ThoughtCo.com".**Don't take my word for it, though. Google "Reptile and Amphibian Intelligence: How Smart Are They?" & see for yourself. As for non-bird maniraptorans, they & Archaeopteryx were 1) similarly intelligent to each other (Google "Directions in Palaeoneurology"), & 2) similarly intelligent to chickens (Google "Brain Architecture and Social Complexity in Modern and Ancient Birds"). Furthermore, chickens 1) "probably fall about mid-range on the intelligence scale of birds" (Google the quote, which is from "Keeping Chickens For Dummies"), & 2) "are intelligent animals, outperforming dogs and cats on many tests of advanced cognition. As just one example, in a study by the Silsoe Research Institute in England, researchers showed that chickens have the ability to make a conscious choice to delay gratification" (Google the quote, which is from "Farm Sanctuary"). Said study is Abeyesinghe et al. 2005 (Google "Can domestic fowl, Gallus gallus domesticus, show self-control?").Quoting Strauss: "Why have we gone into such excruciating detail about dinosaur eggs? Because there's a particular subculture of dinosaur-watchers...and you may know one yourself...who aren't much interested in watching a live pack of Coelophysis but can while away an entire afternoon happily humming to themselves as they arrange and rearrange the Anchisaurus eggs on their mantelpiece."Quoting Strauss: "One problem with establishing the herd behavior of dinosaurs is that there can be multiple explanations for why multiple fossil specimens happen to be discovered in the same location."

The premise for this book is the entertaining fantasy that the reader and their family could load up their SUV and motor off on a dinosaur-viewing tour in the wilds of Utah, or Saskatchewan, or wherever, with the text being a guide to the species they might encounter as well as helpful tips on how to survive the experience. It's very much tongue-in-cheek, and unfortunately at book length the breezy-humorous biz starts to wear thin. After only six or seven entries it becomes a bit old hat to read how fast you'll need to run to escape that particular dino model, what to pack in your cooler to toss out to distract them, their theme song on the radio, and so on.There's an around 40-page introduction on dinosaurs and prehistory in general, followed by -- in alphabetical order by scientific name -- individual sections on 54 dinosaurs or dinosaur-like creatures, plus half a dozen Pleistocene mammals (the "and prehistoric megafauna" featured on the cover). (That's nowhere near enough to do justice to the megafauna, and one wonders why they were even included -- aren't there enough dinosaurs to fill out a book?) The illustrations for each entry are as shown on the cover -- no background, the dinosaur (or other critter) in color, with a human silhouette for scale, and are possibly the best part of the book.There actually is quite a lot of information in this book, but on the one hand author Strauss slings around scientific nomenclature and terminology like a carnival barker shilling the crowd (and mentions quite a few dinos not otherwise pictured or described in the book, which is frustrating), and on the other hand in many of the entries the proportion of silliness to real information approaches about sixty-forty or greater. Even much of the "information" is hugely speculative / imaginative -- Straus has a lot to say about dinosaur behavior, and even what sounds they may have made, which all has to be considered theoretical (unless somebody has been remote viewing dinosaurs, which would be really cool -- I'd buy that book!)Now and then Strauss throws out declarations that beg for more explanation, for example that the formation of the Central American land bridge between North and South America three million years ago "would have fateful consequences for the mammalian megafauna of the time, like the Saber-Toothed Tiger." Why, exactly? Your guess is as good as mine, and likely as good as the author's, considering that Sabertooths are said to have survived until about 11,000 years ago, so whatever consequences couldn't have been all that "fateful"...Strauss also loses no opportunity to slap on yet another layer of his opinion that most of the prehistoric creatures he's discussing were not smart -- dumb -- dumb -- dum-dum -- stoopid. There's nothing on the cover to suggest that this volume might be aimed at any particular age group, but the cataloging data on the indicia page includes "2. Dinosaurs -- North America -- Juvenile Literature" and maybe that's as good a summing-up as any.

a decent index of dinosaurs, alphabetically. It would be even better if there were some types of cross-reference lists by things like locations found, diet, timeframes when they lived (like Jurassic or Cretaceous), etc.

If you enjoy palientology this is a great book. Facts, illistrations and just a pinch of humor. Each picture has a human scale figure for comparision.