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Legendary conservationists show us that we still have the power to prevent critical consequences of the sixth extinction in this game-changing book.
Can we save threatened animals and ecosystems in the midst of a mass extinction? The answer is a resounding yes! Before They Vanish shows us how. In this wise and impassioned book, renowned conservation scientists Paul R. Ehrlich, Gerardo Ceballos, and Rodolfo Dirzo urge us to shift our thinking rather than succumb to grief over the losses that humanity faces. This comprehensive look at a crucial but often overlooked aspect of conservation--population extinction, or the loss of a species within a specific geographic location--guides us onto a new, hopeful path.
The authors argue that conservationists have placed too much emphasis on the extinction of entire species, which occurs gradually enough that we only detect it in the direst of cases. By that time, meaningful action may be impossible. By shifting our focus to identifying extinction threats at the more localized population level, we can intervene more rapidly and effectively to prevent broader declines before it's too late. This change in perspective represents a critical step in saving these vanishing species; early detection and intervention may be our last, best hope for stemming the tide of this global crisis.
Using examples from the worlds of vertebrates, invertebrates, plants, fungi, and microorganisms, the authors explain the concept of population extinction, its causes and consequences, and how to prevent the mass destruction of the amazing and unique creatures with whom we share our planet. This call to action is a must-read for anyone concerned with saving endangered and threatened species, our natural world--and ourselves.
America's Great Plains once possessed one of the grandest wildlife spectacles of the world, equaled only by such places as the Serengeti, the Masai Mara, or the veld of South Africa. Pronghorn antelope, gray wolves, bison, coyotes, wild horses, and grizzly bears: less than two hundred years ago these creatures existed in such abundance that John James Audubon was moved to write, it is impossible to describe or even conceive the vast multitudes of these animals.
In a work that is at once a lyrical evocation of that lost splendor and a detailed natural history of these charismatic species of the historic Great Plains, veteran naturalist and outdoorsman Dan Flores draws a vivid portrait of each of these animals in their glory--and tells the harrowing story of what happened to them at the hands of market hunters and ranchers and ultimately a federal killing program in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The Great Plains with its wildlife intact dazzled Americans and Europeans alike, prompting numerous literary tributes. American Serengeti takes its place alongside these celebratory works, showing us the grazers and predators of the plains against the vast opalescent distances, the blue mountains shimmering on the horizon, the great rippling tracts of yellowed grasslands. Far from the empty flyover country of recent times, this landscape is alive with a complex ecology at least 20,000 years old--a continental patrimony whose wonders may not be entirely lost, as recent efforts hold out hope of partial restoration of these historic species. Written by an author who has done breakthrough work on the histories of several of these animals--including bison, wild horses, and coyotes--American Serengeti is as rigorous in its research as it is intimate in its sense of wonder--the most deeply informed, closely observed view we have of the Great Plains' wild heritage.
The Origin of Species is a seminal work of science that changed the way we understand the natural world. This deluxe hardbound edition is a collector's item featuring a detailed introduction that provides context for Darwin's groundbreaking ideas. A must-have for any science enthusiast or collector of timeless scientific literature.
The life, death and afterlife of one of the true icons of extinction, the Great Auk
The great auk was a flightless, goose-sized bird superbly adapted for life at sea. Fat, flush with feathers and easy to capture, the birds were in trouble whenever sailors visited their once-remote breeding colonies. Places like Funk Island, off north-east Newfoundland, became scenes of unimaginable slaughter, with birds killed in their millions. By 1800 the auks of Funk Island were gone. A scramble by private collectors for specimens of the final few birds then began, a bloody, unthinking destruction of one of the world's most extraordinary species. But their extinction in 1844 wasn't the end of the great auk story, as the bird went on to have a remarkable afterlife; skins, eggs and skeletons became the focus for dozens of collectors in a story of pathological craving and unscrupulous dealings that goes on to this day. In a book rich with insight and packed with tales of birds and of people, Tim Birkhead reveals previously unimagined aspects of the bird's life before humanity, its death on the killing shores of the North Atlantic, and the unrelenting subsequent quest for its remains. The great auk remains a symbol of human folly and the necessity of conservation. This book tells its story.
Gareth Patterson rediscovered the most southerly elephants in the world, the highly endangered and secretive Knysna elephants of the southern Cape, South Africa. It was during this time that he also made the startling discovery of a being even more mysterious than the Knysna elephants - a relict hominoid known to the Knysna forest people as the 'Otang'.
Gareth was at first reluctant to blur the remarkable story of the Knysna elephants with his findings about the otang...
That is, until now.
The possible existence of relict hominoids is today gaining momentum world-wide with ongoing research into the Sasquatch in North America, the Yeti in the Himalayas, the Yowie in Australia and the Orang Pendek in Sumatra. Eminent conservationists and scientists - among them Dr. Jane Goodall, Dr. George Schaller, Dr. Ian Redmond, Professor Jeff Meldrum and Professor Gregory Forth - have publicly stated that they are open-minded about the possible existence of these cryptid beings.
In the course of his unannounced research into the otang Gareth heard many accounts - mostly spontaneous and unprompted - of otang sightings by others in the area over a number of years.
These accounts, documented in this book, are astonishingly consistent both in the descriptions of the otang and in the shocked reactions of the individuals who saw them.
Gareth Patterson's work supports the increasing realization that humankind still has much to learn about the natural world and the mysteries it holds. The possibility that we may be sharing our world with other as yet unidentified hominoids is today being viewed as something that should not be discounted.
And as humankind, we need to reassess our role and responsibility towards all forms of life that coexist with us on planet Earth.
Beyond the Secret Elephants continues the story of Patterson's search for and eventual familiarity with the remaining Knysna elephants, while also revealing...the presence of an even more legendary creature, a relict hominoid known to the indigenous people as the otang.
Dr. Jeff Meldrum. Professor of Anatomy and Anthropology, Idaho State University
...it is impressive when a renowned field researcher writes a book like Beyond the Secret Elephants - following in the erudite footsteps of the late Lyall Watson... Ian Redmond OBE
Oscar Wally Johnson, the undisputed world expert on Pacific Golden-Plovers, and Susan Scott, a popular-science writer, have combined their knowledge and enthusiasm to create a book for everyone who admires the exceptional birds called Kōlea in Hawaiian. With easy-to-understand yet scientifically accurate text and outstanding color photographs, Hawai i's Kōlea: The Amazing Transpacific Life of the Pacific Golden-Plover is a handy, reliable source of information for both general readers and ornithology specialists.
Although the Pacific Golden-Plover is a member of the shorebird group, Kōlea spend most of their time inland, favoring open space with short vegetation. This makes Hawai i's cemeteries, golf courses, and backyard lawns prime real estate for these migratory birds. Each year Kōlea fly thousands of miles nonstop from Alaska and return to the same spot in the Islands, whether a condominium courtyard, a busy beach park, or a strip of grass in downtown Honolulu. As a result, many Hawai i residents get to know individual birds, calling them my Kōlea. In turn, urban plovers often grow tame around people, an endearing trait uncommon in other birds. Their human admirers see city Kōlea as charming, alert, and personable--qualities that, together with their grace and beauty, have made them arguably Hawai i's favorite bird. Observing the birds gives rise to countless questions: When do the birds leave Hawai i? When do they return? Do they have chicks in the Islands? How long does it take them to fly to Alaska? To answer these and other questions, the authors have gathered together just about every detail researchers know about Pacific Golden-Plovers. If you marvel at the remarkable birds that prance through your park, strut in your street, and rest on your rooftop, this book will make you love Kōlea even more.
The quiet manatee has long been a flash point of frequent environmental debates. It is Florida's most famous endangered species, as well as its most controversial. Manatees appear on hundreds of license plates, attract hordes of tourists, and expose the uneasy relationships between science and the law and between freedom and responsibility like no other animal.
As passions have flared and resentments have grown, the battle over manatee protection has evolved into a war, and no reporter has followed the story more closely than Craig Pittman, the first environmental writer to explore the complex history, culture, and science of the controversies and concerns surrounding this remarkable creature.
With an abiding interest in the uncertain fate of this unique species, Manatee Insanity provides the first in-depth history of the attempts to provide legal protection for the manatee. Pittman follows Florida's gentle giants through time and space, detailing interactions with a variety of human actors, from Jacques-Yves Cousteau to Jeb Bush to Jimmy Buffett, from a popular children's book author to a federal lawman who dressed in a gorilla suit for the ultimate undercover assignment.
We are living in the midst of the Earth's sixth great extinction event, the first one caused by a single species: our own. In Wild Dog Dreaming, Deborah Bird Rose explores what constitutes an ethical relationship with nonhuman others in this era of loss. She asks, Who are we, as a species? How do we fit into the Earth's systems? Amidst so much change, how do we find our way into new stories to guide us? Rose explores these questions in the form of a dialogue between science and the humanities. Drawing on her conversations with Aboriginal people, for whom questions of extinction are up-close and very personal, Rose develops a mode of exposition that is dialogical, philosophical, and open-ended.
An inspiration for Rose--and a touchstone throughout her book--is the endangered dingo of Australia. The dingo is not the first animal to face extinction, but its story is particularly disturbing because the threat to its future is being actively engineered by humans. The brazenness with which the dingo is being wiped out sheds valuable, and chilling, light on the likely fate of countless other animal and plant species.
People save what they love, observed Michael Soul , the great conservation biologist. We must ask whether we, as humans, are capable of loving--and therefore capable of caring for--the animals and plants that are disappearing in a cascade of extinctions. Wild Dog Dreaming engages this question, and the result is a bold account of the entangled ethics of love, contingency, and desire.
A haunting photographic record of extinction
A photograph of an extinct animal evokes a greater feeling of loss than any painting ever could. Often black and white or tinted sepia, these remarkable images have been taken mainly in zoos or wildlife parks, and in some cases depict the last known individual of the species. Lost Animals is a unique photographic record of extinction, presented by a world authority on vanished animals. Richly illustrated throughout, this handsome book features photographs dating from around 1870 to as recently as 2004, the year that witnessed the demise of the Hawaiian Po'ouli. From a mother Thylacine and her pups to birds such as the Heath Hen and the Carolina Parakeet, Errol Fuller tells the story of each animal, explains why it became extinct, and discusses the circumstances surrounding the photography. Covering 28 extinct species, Lost Animals includes familiar examples like the last Passenger Pigeon, Martha, and one of the last Ivory-billed Woodpeckers, photographed as it peers quizzically at the hat of one of the biologists who has just ringed it. But the book includes rare images as well, many never before published. Collected together here for the first time, these photographs provide a tangible link to animals that have now vanished forever, in a book that brings the past to life while delivering a warning for the future. Poignant and compelling, Lost Animals also includes a concise introduction that looks at the earliest days of animal photography, and an appendix of drawings and paintings of the species covered.
Shortlisted for the 2024 Richard Jefferies Award for nature writing.
In Lost Wonders Tom Lathan tells ten powerful stories of species that have lived, died out and been declared extinct since the turn of the twenty-first century. 'Timely, elegiac' Daily Mail
What's to be done when only three spotted owls are left in Canada's wild? When wolves eat endangered caribou, cormorants kill rare trees, and housing developments threaten a tiny frog?
Environmental journalist Sarah Cox has witnessed what happens when we drive species to the brink of extinction. In Signs of Life, she tags along with the Canadian military, Indigenous guardians, biologists, conservationists, and ordinary people who are racing to save hundreds of species before it's too late.
Travelling across the country, Cox visits the Toronto Zoo, home of Canada's only wildlife biobank, where scientists conserve living cells from endangered species in the event of future loss; tours Canada's military bases, home to some of Canada's last preserved ecosystems; and travels to Indigenous communities where land stewards are striving to restore the delicate ecological balance that has sustained people for millennia.
Through the eyes and work of individuals who are bringing species back from the precipice, Cox delivers both an urgent message and a fresh perspective on how we can protect biodiversity and begin to turn things around.
World's Most Endangered offers a fascinating facts and mind-blowing information on some of the world's rarest creatures. It focuses on 25 species of mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians which are classified as Critically Endangered by the WWF and IUCN.
Each account begins with stunning photographs and a fact panel giving key information, before providing detailed insight into the lives of these species, plus the threats they face and the conservation efforts being made to ensure their survival.
Animals covered include causes celebres such as Sumatran Tiger, Mountain Gorilla, Pangolin, Leatherback Turtle and California Condor, together with lesser-known animals in peril like the Lemur Leaf Frog, Geometric Tortoise and Red Wolf. It gives an entertaining and engaging take on the subject, and is ideal for either reading right the way through or just dipping into a chapter at a time.