The Feather Quest


Pete Dunne - 1992
    Among them were Pete and Linda Dunne, who set off from there on a year-long odyssey. Dunne has poured the most remarkable stories, birds, and characters into this unforgettable book about their once-in-a-lifetime adventure.

When the Water Runs Out


David Canford - 2015
    Drought threatens to destroy the livelihood of millions and result in the biggest forced migration in history. The President needs to find a solution quickly while keeping the true scale of the problem secret to avoid panic and his plan confidential to prevent opposition to it. Witnessing a murder, Angel Tarak discovers he now has become a target. He embarks on a dangerous quest to reveal the truth to try and change the future. Events spiral out of control propelling America and Canada towards war. A thriller that flows from Arizona to Northern Canada and DC to Ottawa, with conspiracy, murder and a hunt through uncompromising wilderness. Set only a few years in the future, a novel of what could happen. Will the water run out?

Client Earth


James Thornton - 2017
    Every new year is the hottest in human history, while forest, reef, ice, tundra, and species are disappearing forever. It is easy to lose all hope.Who will stop the planet from committing ecological suicide? The UN? Governments? Activists? Corporations? Engineers? Scientists? Whoever, environmental laws need to be enforceable and enforced. Step forward a fresh breed of passionately purposeful environmental lawyers. They provide new rules to legislatures, see that they are enforced, and keep us informed. They tackle big business to ensure money flows into cultural change, because money is the grammar of business just as science is the grammar of nature.At the head of this new legal army stands James Thornton, who takes governments to court, and wins. And his client is the Earth.With Client Earth, we travel from Poland to Ghana, from Alaska to China, to see how citizens can use public interest law to protect their planet. Foundations and philanthropists support the law group ClientEarth because they see, plainly and brightly, that the law is a force all parties recognize. Lawyers who take the Earth as their client are exceptional and inspirational. They give us back our hope.

Conservation Is Our Government Now: The Politics of Ecology in Papua New Guinea


Paige West - 2006
    Drawing on extensive fieldwork conducted over a period of seven years, Paige West focuses on the Crater Mountain Wildlife Management Area, the site of a biodiversity conservation project implemented between 1994 and 1999. She describes the interactions between those who ran the program—mostly ngo workers—and the Gimi people who live in the forests surrounding Crater Mountain. West shows that throughout the project there was a profound disconnect between the goals of the two groups. The ngo workers thought that they would encourage conservation and cultivate development by teaching Gimi to value biodiversity as an economic resource. The villagers expected that in exchange for the land, labor, food, and friendship they offered the conservation workers, they would receive benefits, such as medicine and technology. In the end, the divergent nature of each group’s expectations led to disappointment for both.West reveals how every aspect of the Crater Mountain Wildlife Management Area—including ideas of space, place, environment, and society—was socially produced, created by changing configurations of ideas, actions, and material relations not only in Papua New Guinea but also in other locations around the world. Complicating many of the assumptions about nature, culture, and development underlying contemporary conservation efforts, Conservation Is Our Government Now demonstrates the unique capacity of ethnography to illuminate the relationship between the global and the local, between transnational processes and individual lives.

Fly for the Prosecution: How Insect Evidence Helps Solve Crimes


M. Lee Goff - 2000
    To Lee Goff and his fellow forensic entomologists, each body recovered at a crime scene is an ecosystem, a unique microenvironment colonized in succession by a diverse array of flies, beetles, mites, spiders, and other arthropods: some using the body to provision their young, some feeding directly on the tissues and by-products of decay, and still others preying on the scavengers.Using actual cases on which he has consulted, Goff shows how knowledge of these insects and their habits allows forensic entomologists to furnish investigators with crucial evidence about crimes. Even when a body has been reduced to a skeleton, insect evidence can often provide the only available estimate of the postmortem interval, or time elapsed since death, as well as clues to whether the body has been moved from the original crime scene, and whether drugs have contributed to the death.An experienced forensic investigator who regularly advises law enforcement agencies in the United States and abroad, Goff is uniquely qualified to tell the fascinating if unsettling story of the development and practice of forensic entomology.

Portrait of a Burger as a Young Calf: The Story of One Man, Two Cows, and the Feeding of a Nation


Peter Lovenheim - 2002
    Determined to understand the process by which living animals become food, Lovenheim did the only thing he could think of: He bought a calf—make that twin calves, number 7 and number 8—from the dairy farm where they were born and asked for permission to spend as much time as necessary hanging around and observing everything that happened in the lives of these farm animals. Portrait of a Burger as a Young Calf is the provocative true story of Peter Lovenheim’s hands-on journey into the dairy and beef industries as he follows his calves from conception to possible consumption. In the process, he gets to know the good, hard-working people who raise our cattle and make milk products, beef, and veal available to consumers like you and me. He supplies us with a “fly on the wall” view of how these animals are used to put food on America’s very abundant tables.Constantly vigilant about wanting to be an observer who never interferes, Lovenheim allows the reader to see every aspect of a cow’s life, without passing judgment. Reading this book will forever change the way you think about food and the people and animals who provide it for us.From the Hardcover edition.

Birdsong


Don Stap - 2005
    Why does the chestnut-sided warbler sing one song before dawn and another after sunrise? Why does the brown thrasher have a repertoire of two thousand songs when the chipping sparrow has only one? And how is the hermit thrush able to sing a duet with itself, producing two sounds simultaneously to create its beautiful, flutelike melody?Stap's lucid prose distills the complexities of the study of birdsong and unveils a remarkable discovery that sheds light on the mystery of mysteries: why young birds in the suborder oscines -- the "true songbirds" -- learn their songs but the closely related suboscines are born with their songs genetically encoded. As the story unfolds, Stap contemplates our enduring fascination with birdsong, from ancient pictographs and early Greek soothsayers, who knew that bird calls represented the voices of the gods, to the story of Mozart's pet starling.In a modern, noisy world, it is increasingly difficult to hear those voices of the gods. Exploring birdsong takes us to that rare place -- in danger of disappearing forever -- where one hears only the planet's oldest music.

The Woman Who Lives in the Earth


Swain Wolfe - 1993
    In this timeless place, young Sarah has become the target of the local villagers' superstition because of her fascination with the mysteries of nature. Believing her to be the cause of the drought, they gather into an angry mob bent on destroying her. Pursued by their hatred and aided only by her great-grandmother and a strange foxlike creature named Marishan Borison, Sarah uses the hidden forms and patterns of the natural world to transform herself as well as her enemies. Touched by magic, The Woman Who Lives in the Earth is a haunting parable that speaks to the concerns of our time with simplicity and grace.

Half Gone


Jeremy Leggett - 2005
    Exposing the true status of the world's dwindling energy supplies, Jeremy Leggett reveals the scale of the disaster looming over our planet, and the action each and every one of us must take - right now - to stand a chance of averting it.

Nightwalk: A Journey to the Heart of Nature


Chris Yates - 2012
    

Caterpillars of Eastern North America: A Guide to Identification and Natural History


David L. Wagner - 2005
    The more than 1,200 color photographs and two dozen line drawings include numerous exceptionally striking images. The giant silk moths, tiger moths, and many other species covered include forest pests, common garden guests, economically important species, and of course, the Mescal Worm and Mexican Jumping Bean caterpillars. Full-page species accounts cover almost 400 species, with up to six images per species including an image of the adult plus succinct text with information on distribution, seasonal activity, foodplants, and life history. These accounts are generously complemented with additional images of earlier instars, closely related species, noteworthy behaviors, and other intriguing aspects of caterpillar biology.Many caterpillars are illustrated here for the first time. Dozens of new foodplant records are presented and erroneous records are corrected. The book provides considerable information on the distribution, biology, and taxonomy of caterpillars beyond that available in other popular works on Eastern butterflies and moths. The introductory chapter covers caterpillar structure, life cycles, rearing, natural enemies, photography, and conservation. The section titled Caterpillar Projects will be of special interest to educators.Given the dearth of accessible guides on the identification and natural history of caterpillars, Caterpillars of Eastern North America is a must for entomologists and museum curators, forest managers, conservation biologists and others who seek a compact, easy-to-use guide to the caterpillars of this vast region. A compact guide to nearly 700 caterpillars east of the Mississippi, from forest pests to garden guests and economically important species 1,200 color photos and 24 line drawings enable easy identification Full-page species accounts with image of adult insect for almost 400 species, plus succinct text on distribution and other vital information Many caterpillars illustrated here for the first time Current information on distribution, biology, and taxonomy not found in other popular works A section geared toward educators, Caterpillar Projects An indispensable resource for all who seek an easy-to-use guide to the caterpillars of this vast region

Hawks from Every Angle: How to Identify Raptors in Flight


Jerry Liguori - 2005
    Across North America, tens of thousands of people gather every spring and fall at more than one thousand known hawk migration sites--from New Jersey's Cape May to California's Golden Gate. Yet, as many discover, a standard field guide, with its emphasis on plumage, is often of little help in identifying those raptors soaring, gliding, or flapping far, far away.Hawks from Every Angle takes hawk identification to new heights. It offers a fresh approach that literally looks at the birds from every angle, compares and contrasts deceptively similar species, and provides the pictures (and words) needed for identification in the field. Jerry Liguori pinpoints innovative, field-tested identification traits for each species from the various angles that they are seen.Featuring 339 striking color photos on 68 color plates and 32 black & white photos, Hawks from Every Angle is unique in presenting a host of meticulously crafted pictures for each of the 19 species it covers in detail--the species most common to migration sites throughout the United States and Canada. All aspects of raptor identification are discussed, including plumage, shape, and flight style traits.For all birders who follow hawk migration and have found themselves wondering if the raptor in the sky matches the one in the guide, Hawks from Every Angle--distilling an expert's years of experience for the first time into a comprehensive array of truly useful photos and other pointers for each species--is quite simply a must.Key Features? The essential new approach to identifying hawks in flight Innovative, accurate, and field-tested identification traits for each species 339 color photos on 68 color plates, 32 black & white photos Compares and contrasts species easily confused with one another, and provides the pictures (and words) needed for identification in the field Covers in detail 19 species common to migration sites throughout the North America Discusses light conditions, how molt can alter the shape of a bird, aberrant plumages, and migration seasons and sites User-friendly format

Green: A Field Guide to Marijuana: (Books about Marijuana, Guide to Cannabis, Weed Bible)


Dan Michaels - 2015
    Presented in an eye-popping package and filled with hyperdetailed photography of individual buds, this essential guide to marijuana is smart, practical, and exceedingly beautiful. The "Primer" section explores the culture of this complex flower and explains the botany that makes each strain unique. The "Buds" section describes the variations of lineage, flavor, and mental or physical high that define 170 exceptional strains. Poised to become the go-to marijuana guide for recreational and medicinal users alike, Green is easy to pick up and impossible to put down.

Your Money or Your Life - Abridged


Vicki Robin - 2009
    Vicki Robin offers Your Money or Your Life, an original audio adaptation of the New York Times bestselling book that has helped more than 600,000 people worldwide gain greater financial freedom. Join this acclaimed author for hands-on tools and insights that will help you reach new levels of comfort, competence, and consciousness around your personal finances. Building on the recent updates and revisions to the book Your Money or Your Life (Penguin, 2008), this two-CD program reflects the major social, technological, and environmental changes since its first publication in 1992 plus wisdom from 15 years of readers lived experiences including: --How to develop your financial intelligence, integrity, and independence--the three keys to lasting fulfillment. --A million-and-one sure ways to save money how controlling your spending starts with controlling your thoughts. --How to manage your money so that you have a life you love with the money you have. Whether you're trying to plan for your future, recover from poor choices in the past, or manage your finances better, Your Money or Your Lifeprovides proven tools and powerful teachings to help you get there no matter what financial storm blows your way.

Historical Atlas of World Mythology 1: The Way of the Animal Powers


Joseph Campbell - 1983
    Anthropological theory