PlanetCatfish.com

In response to this thread
http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/view ... 38&t=34705

exasperatus2002 said,

You guys do an awesome job keeping everything updated and correct. I'd love to see the libraries you have.

Firstly, thanks that means a lot to all of us.

And since you asked I snapped some pics of my library. Keep in mind I have a two drawer filing cabinet of papers and gigs of digital files.

-Shane

More shelves...
-Shane

Hmmm not as tidy as Shanes

I could probably fill another couple shelves but this is the main bit.
There are quite a few that are signed by the authors.

Some of the best stuff is in the plainest wrappers, old revisions etc. African information is fairly scattered.
I too have scads of pdf's.
The three big binders(along with some of the above publications) represent 146 of the 182 fish whether correct or mistaken originally described with the name Synodontis...I found thats a lot of work for someone without access to a university...only 36 more to go.

Should note missing from this picture is the complete set of Aquarium Digest International which were individually mailed to me as a young lad...besides the public library they were all I had so they are fairly worn, it is now hard to imagine the only information I had would come every two months, which is why I have to chuckle when some people get antsy when they do not get an answer in the forum within the hour.

Birger

Here is my horrendous mess that is my library. My wife has long given up nagging me to clean it up, and it continues to grow as an ugly sprawl. Only about three-quarters of the shelving you see are fish/fish-related books. The other quarter (to the far left) largely consists of my recreational reading (military history, mostly aviation-related and vertebrate paleontology).



There is another shelf that I keep most of the catfish-only books and theses:





(the first three books in the left of the second photo of this series are an original copy of Bleeker's catfish Prodromus that I rebound, and printed and bound copies of all catfish papers published in Zootaxa for 2003-2006 and 2009-2010).

I arranged the rest of the library geographically (not always strictly adhered to), so here's the Asian section:









Australasian+European



African



South American



North and Central American (which is actually much larger than all but the Asian section)



Miscellaneous (mostly) fish books that I did not/could not place geographically





There were a couple more shelves (all the aquarium fish books) that I did not include, as are the oversized books (e.g. the Smithsonian reprint of the catfish volume of Bleeker's Atlas). My printed reprint collection (two filing cabinets’ worth) is not stored at home, so I didn't include that either.

As far as physical books, I currently parasitize the libraries of my advisor and labmates... My paltry book collection resides on only half a shelf space. Off the top of my head, the only fish books I own are The Diversity of Fishes, Nelson's Fishes of the World, Wootton's Ecology of Teleost Fishes, and Brittan's review of Rasbora. Some of the books that reside on my shelf are the Back to Nature L-number guide and Mergus Wels Atlas Vol I and II, and I frequently reference copies of Fishes of Alabama and Peterson's Guide to Fishes of North America. I have a few miscellaneous aquarium fish books also. I have quite a number of books on my wishlist, many of which appear in the libraries already posted. I have a few reprints that have been given to me as well, but for scientific papers mostly I just use the PDF's on my computer; my PDF library includes approximately 4,000 PDF's. I keep track of recent papers through various RSS feeds set up for many journals; unfortunately not all journals provide such a feature but my PDF library nevertheless has grown at a frightening pace. Heok Hee makes sure I can at least hear about the recent catfish papers for journals that I am not subscribed to by RSS feed when he posts on the Science News forum!

Silurus wrote:Here is my horrendous mess that is my library.

I think we have a winner

I already knew that none of us would hold a candle to HH.

@ Birger, "One Fish Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish" Never quit thought of that as a reference

@ HH, "Fishes of Rhodesia" has to be the winner book in any library.

Loved blowing up the pics and browsing your libraries. Almost as good as an actual visit.

It did occur to me to spread out a bunch of catfish books on the floor as a mosaic and photo them for use as a screen saver.
-Shane

Wow. Just as I thought incredible. Thank you for posting them for us all. Now I have some new titles to add to my Christmas list...

This is mine. I havent bought many recently though. Most of these are scientific books rather than hobbyist books. Two of my Baensch books arent showing here, and my Ian Fuller & Hans Evers Corydoradinae book and DATZ L number one.

All great collections, I might have had a decent collection too if books like these were more available in my local bookstores. Just curious, do most of you purchase these books in stores or online?

Hey, what a nice thread!
I'm impresses by the sheer amount of absolutely great books some have.
Best piece in my small collection is a book on tropical fishes of my grandfathers', who died years before I was born.
It's the only object I have from him. A small treasure.

@ Birger, "One Fish Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish" Never quit thought of that as a reference

In the right circles it is a classic

@ HH, "Fishes of Rhodesia" has to be the winner book in any library.

Has my vote
(EDIT just found and ordered it...look what you have started)

For those with an interest in this area... there is another that was just released last month, "The Fishes of Zimbabwe and their Biology" which apparently has a limited number of copies available http://www.stevensimpsonbooks.com/?page ... a4c00597f4 mine should be here any day. I am not sure who has them available in the US, but the above will ship.

Best piece in my collection is a book on tropical fishes of my grandfathers', who died years before I was born.
It's the only object I have from him. A small treasure.

Treasure indeed !

Just curious, do most of you purchase these books in stores or online?

For me it is generally online nowadays...I do always look for books at fish auctions. Then there is AbeBooks.com, amazon, NHBS http://www.nhbs.com/title.php?bkfno=184510&ad_id=912 for anything difficult I always check with http://www.stevensimpsonbooks.com/ Often you need to go directly to the publisher. I have not done online auctions but I am sure they could be a good source.

Birger

Very impressive libraries of fish books.
My library is not as large until I add all my fly fishing books.
I have about a 50/50 mix of the two genre.

I have about half a meter or so - don't think it's worth taking a photo of.

I do have a fair number of files as well...

--
Mats

Stackdeck wrote:All great collections, I might have had a decent collection too if books like these were more available in my local bookstores. Just curious, do most of you purchase these books in stores or online?

Mostly online - I'd say 80% at least - (I use http://www.stevensimpsonbooks.com a lot) but also conventions and auctions. Will post a few pics later.

Jools

About 90% of my collection was assembled through online purchases, 5% as gifts and the other 5% from brick-and-mortar stores and booths at meetings (e.g. ASIH).

I try to avoid Steven Simpson and NHBS, though, because of the high markup. eBay has worked pretty well for me (because there are usually very few people with a similar interest who might bid against you). It's mostly biblio.com, alibris and abebooks for me at this stage for used books, and bookdepository.com for yet-to-be published works (because you can get at least 25% off making a preorder and they offer free shipping worldwide).

Although I have quite a few (cat-)fish books, they are hugely outnumbered by books on cars & motorcycles. Therefore I will not bother you with a picture.

Birger wrote: For those with an interest in this area... there is another that was just released last month, "The Fishes of Zimbabwe and their Biology" which apparently has a limited number of copies available http://www.stevensimpsonbooks.com/?page ... a4c00597f4 mine should be here any day. I am not sure who has them available in the US, but the above will ship.

Mine arrived today. I had no idea what it would be like, but I'm very glad I bought it.

Having been to "Zim" several times, I'd like to volunteer for the book review, but I doubt I would be able to do it for the next couple of month or two. So, if anyone is itching to do it now, go ahead, or leave it to me.

I'd love more book reviews and I don't think anyone will be writing one sooner.

Cheers,

Jools