Best of
Nature

1971

In the Shadow of Man


Jane Goodall - 1971
    Jane Goodall was a young secretarial school graduate when the legendary Louis Leakey chose her to undertake a landmark study of chimpanzees in the world. This paperback edition contains 80 photographs and in introduction by Stephen Jay Gould.

The Night Country


Loren Eiseley - 1971
    Weaving together memoir, philosophical reflection, and his always keen observations of the natural world, Loren Eiseley’s essays in The Night Country explore those moments, often dark and unexpected, when chance encounters disturb our ordinary understandings of the universe. The naturalist here seeks neither “salvation in facts” nor solace in wild places: discovering an old bone or a nest of wasps, or remembering the haunted spaces of his lonely Nebraska childhood, Eiseley recognizes what he calls “the ghostliness of myself,” his own mortality, and the paradoxes of the evolution of consciousness.

Encounters with the Archdruid


John McPhee - 1971
    The four men portrayed here have different relationships to their environment, and they encounter each other on mountain trails, in forests and rapids, sometimes with reserve, sometimes with friendliness, sometimes fighting hard across a philosophical divide.

The Insect Societies


Edward O. Wilson - 1971
    Conducts a definitive study of the social structure and symbiotic relationships of termites, social wasps, bees, and ants.

Beyond the Wall: Essays from the Outside


Edward Abbey - 1971
    In this wise and lyrical book about landscapes of the desert and the mind, Edward Abbey guides us beyond the wall of the city and asphalt belting of superhighways to special pockets of wilderness that stretch from the interior of Alaska to the dry lands of Mexico.

Living on the Earth: Celebrations, Storm Warnings, Formulas, Recipes, Rumors, and Country Dances


Alicia Bay Laurel - 1971
    Living on the Earth is for people who would rather chop wood for fire than work behind a desk to pay the electric company. It's for people who want the best recipe for lavender soap or huckleberry jam. It's for people who want to make their own clothing, play guitar, learn woodcarving, gardening, canning and drying food, and natural first aid methods. The book has no chapters; no rigid structures or rules. It grew naturally out of the lessons the author has learned, and which she shares now with yet another enthusiastic generation. Living on the Earth is a beautiful book to see and read, as well as a spiritually uplifting work whose simplicity radiates warmth and promotes serenity and goodwill to all those who encounter it. The large format paperback is entirely written in Alicia's cursive script and illustrated on every page with her line drawings. Alicia's innovative illustration and book design styles have been enthusiastically emulated in dozens of books and greeting cards. Alicia Bay Laurel has passionately followed her muse since early childhood. She was just twenty years old when Living on the Earth was originally published; the book would go on to become a best-selling, trend-setting manual for natural, conscious living. The book celebrated its 30th anniversary in 2000. Alicia still sings, plays guitar, writes, and enjoys life in Hawaii.

Fillets of Plaice


Gerald Durrell - 1971
    But what shines through these five vignettes is the author's engagement with and immense affection for animals in all their forms. From fish to fowl, from lizards to little water fleas (daphnia), Durrell's eye is acute and his prose is tart. You can read this book for the humor alone (for he did perceive his family as some rare and rarefied species), but between the lines you can discern the makings of a world-class naturalist and a cultivated and engaging writer.

Nature's Children


Juliette De Bairacli Levy - 1971
    Back in print at last! Remedies, recipes, and fascinating lore on nourishing and healing children naturally."Surely this is how our children were meant to be raised and nourished! In harmony with the rhythms of the earth, seasons, wild creatures, and plants, the author shares her knowledge and compassion. How I wish I had known of Nature's Children when my son was younger, but it's never too late to begin employing the remedies and recipes contained in this marvelous book which is dedicated to the simple life and family health."

The Herbal or General History of Plants


John Gerard - 1971
    Containing almost 2,850 plant descriptions and 2,705 superb illustrations, Gerard’s Herbal is a monumental work, the book all modern English herbals are derived from, and the one herbal every serious enthusiast should have in its entirety. Original editions are worth perhaps $750.

The Winter Of The Fisher


Cameron Langford - 1971
    A fisher survives his first year in the wilderness through the help of a kind Ojibway.

An Island Called California: An Ecological Introduction to Its Natural Communities


Elna Bakker - 1971
    Striking new photographs illustrate the diversity of life, climate, and geological formation.

A Lion Called Christian: The True Story of the Remarkable Bond Between Two Friends and a Lion


Anthony Bourke - 1971
    It captures the moving reunion of two young men and their pet lion Christian, after they had left him in Africa with Born Free’s George Adamson to introduce him into his rightful home in the wild.A Lion Called Christian tells the remarkable story of how Anthony “Ace” Bourke and John Rendall, visitors to London from Australia in 1969, bought the boisterous lion cub in the pet department of Harrods. For several months, the three of them shared a flat above a furniture shop on London’s King’s Road, where the charismatic and intelligent Christian quickly became a local celebrity, cruising the streets in the back of a Bentley, popping in for lunch at a local restaurant, even posing for a fashion advertisement. But the lion cub was growing up—fast—and soon even the walled church garden where he went for exercise wasn’t large enough for him. How could Ace and John avoid having to send Christian to a zoo for the rest of his life? A coincidental meeting with English actors Virginia McKenna and Bill Travers, stars of the hit film Born Free, led to Christian being flown to Kenya and placed under the expert care of “the father of lions” George Adamson. Incredibly, when Ace and John returned to Kenya to see Christian a year later, they received a loving welcome from their lion, who was by then fully integrated into Africa and a life with other lions. Originally published in 1971, and now fully revised and updated with more than 50 photographs of Christian from cuddly cub in London to magnificent lion in Africa, A Lion Called Christian is a touching and uplifting true story of an indelible human-animal bond. It is is destined to become one of the great classics of animal literature.

Diving For Sunken Treasure


Jacques-Yves Cousteau - 1971
    In this expedition to the famous Silver Bank, a coral reef in the Caribbean, Cousteau and his men unearth the remains of a shipwreck that had been buried for centuries, concealed by the various forms of life in the tropical waters.

The New Savory Wild Mushroom


Margaret McKenny - 1971
    To ask why is to ask why fire burns. His credo may be stated thus: he has sworn an oath to keep his mushroom patches secret and to find and to poach on the patches of other hunters. When mushrooms are the prize, the scope of all his aspirations is narrowed to these two goals. Though in all else he may be as Saintly as St. Francis, in the pursuit of these ends he is more Satanic than Satan. He will betray his nearest and dearest without the slightest twitch of flesh or spirit. He is amoral."--Definition of a mushroom hunter by Angelo PellegriniThis classic field guide answers the amateur mycologist's two most important questions: "What is it?" and "Is it good to eat?" Color photographs illustrate 199 species of mushrooms ranging from boletes to puffballs, chantrelles to truffles. Full descriptions clearly identify the edible or poisonous qualities of each.

The Unforeseen Wilderness: Kentucky's Red River Gorge


Wendell Berry - 1971
    Wendell Berry just as easily steps into Kentucky’s Red River Gorge and makes the observations of a poet as he does step away to view his subject with the keen, unflinching eye of an essayist. The inimitable voice of Wendell Berry—at once frank and lovely—is our guide as we explore this unique wilderness.Located in eastern Kentucky and home to 26,000 acres of untamed river, rock formations, historical sites, unusual vegetation and wildlife, the Gorge very nearly fell victim to a man-made lake thirty years ago. “No place is to be learned like a textbook,” Berry tells us, and so through revealing the Gorge’s corners and crevices, its ridges and rapids, his words not only implore us to know more but to venture there ourselves. Infused with his very personal perspective and enhanced by the startling photographs of Ralph Eugene Meatyard, The Unforeseen Wilderness draws the reader in to celebrate an extraordinary natural beauty and to better understand what threatens it.

The Pattern Under The Plough


George Ewart Evans - 1971
    Although based on East Anglia, this book was and remains of wider interest, for - as the author pointed out at the time - similar changes were occurring in North America, and also happening with remarkable speed in Africa. In chronicling the old culture George Ewart Evans has taken its two chief aspects, the home and the farm. He describes the house with its fascinating constructional details, the magic invoked for its protection, the mystique of the hearth, the link of the bees with the people of the house, and some of their fears and pre-occupations. Among the chapters on the farm is one of Evans's most original pieces of research: the description of the secret horse societies. Beautifully illustrated by David Gentleman, this book is important not only for the material it reveals about the past but for the implications for present-day society. 'As real (and as valuable) as the evidence unearthed by the spadework of archaeology.' Observer

Slickrock


Edward Abbey - 1971
    Illustrated throughout with lush, color photography by Philip Hyde. Text by Edward Abbey. Scores of dazzling color photographs taken of what Abbey described as "the one part of Earth that is still almost as it was before man began to tinker with the land -- a piece of Utah that ought to remain that way."

Stalking the Good Life


Euell Gibbons - 1971
    

American Wild Flowers Coloring Book


Paul E. Kennedy - 1971
    Redrawn from the original Smithsonian Rickett plates by Paul Kennedy, well-known illustrator of children's books, each of the 46 renderings is ready to be colored as realistically — like the cover illustrations — or as imaginatively as you may choose. Includes 46 illustrations: lady's slipper, black-eyed susan, bird's foot violet, cardinal flower, pitcher plant, trout lily, and others. Botanical identifications, common names, and information on habitats are also included.

Chipmunks on the Doorstep


Edwin Tunis - 1971
    The author-artist relates his observations on the habits of the backyard chipmunks he encouraged to become pets.

Thoreau's World: Miniatures From His Journal


Henry David Thoreau - 1971
    

Fire


George R. Stewart - 1971
    Stewart in this engrossing novel of a fire started by lightning in the dry heat of September, and fanned out of control by unexpected winds. The book begins with the origins of the fire—smoldering quietly at first, unnoticed, then suddenly bursting into a terrifying inferno, devouring trees and animals over acre after acre and leaving nothing but desolation in its wake.Firefighters and lookouts, forest rangers and smokejumpers—as well as animals in the forest, many of them the bewildered victims of the blaze, and all the varied tress and bushes there—are characters of this realistic story.

Curious Woodcuts of Fanciful and Real Beasts: A Selection of 190 Sixteenth-Century Woodcuts from Gesner's and Topsell's Natural


Konrad Gesner - 1971
    

A Majority of Scoundrels: An Informal History of the Rocky Mountain Fur Company


Don Berry - 1971
    Is a lively and captivating history of the formative years of the American fur trade, the period in which the Rocky Mountain Fur Company, with its corps of trappers and traders, grew to be "the greatest name in the mountains."

The Earth


Arthur Beiser - 1971
    Book 7 of the Life Nature Library.

The Lord's Woods: The Passing of an American Woodland


Robert S. Arbib - 1971
    

From the Roof of Africa


C.W. Nicol - 1971
    For two incredible years he tried to cope with his monumental assignment amongst the proud and fierce hill tribesmen whose society was as ancient as the Old Testament, and for whom the 'conservation' desired by Addis Ababa meant only an abridgement of time-honoured freedom to hunt what they chose, to farm anywhere and everywhere. This is how Nicol persevered, fascinated by the challenge. Each day brought new threats to the creation of the park - violence, bribery, the involved politics of the high hills and the rising anger of the tribesmen, who resented their land being taken by the government to make a place for the animals.

Beyond Your Doorstep: A Handbook to the Country


Hal Borland - 1971
    "It is primarily about the countryside, not the wilderness; countrysides are common and within reach of almost everyone." In fact, Borland's countrysides are still just beyond your own doorstep, where meadow, woods, riverbank and roadside wait, each of them filled with everyday wonders. And although the author acknowledges that many of his readers will only follow his eloquent lead vicariously, his book is an invitation to "getting up and out," exploring nature in person and discovering the interdependence of animals and plants. Originally published in 1962, Beyond Your Doorstep is now more timely than ever as a source of inspiration for anyone with a desire to know more about the living things we so often look at but never actually see or understand.

My Canyonlands: I had the freedom of it


Kent Frost - 1971