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A collection of anecdotes, facts, figures, folklore and literature, The Nature Magpie is a veritable treasure trove of humanity's thoughts and feelings about nature. With acclaimed nature writer Daniel Allen as your guide, join naturalists, novelists and poets as they explore the most isolated parts of the planet, choose your side - pineapple or durian - in the great 'king of fruits' debate and discover which plants can be used to predict the weather. Meet the roadkill connoisseurs, learn to dance the Hippopotamus Polka, find out the likelihood of sharing your name with a hurricane - and much more.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Introduction. Wonderful Relationships: Darwinian Stories of Origins
• 1. "Curtiosity's" Child: Bobby Darwin's Impertinent Early Years
• 2. Darwin and the Pampas Pirates: Adventure in Search of Treasure
• 3. Fossils, Fools & Faults: Rounding South America
• 4. Irritating Worms: The Elderly Darwin Fascinated by the Intelligence of Worms
• 5. A Lungfish Walked into the Zoo: On the Origin of Limbs from Lobe-Fins
• 6. Out on a Limb: Sketching Bone by Bone from Joint to Joint at the Zoo
• 7. Nosey Elephants: A Tale of Trunks and Tusks
• 8. The Bearduck of Baleen: On the Origin of New Traits from Existing Ones
• 9. The Saga of Mooshmael: The Logic of Family Relationships
• 10. The Higgledy-Piggledy Whale: Leviathan's Walk, Paddle, and Gallop to the Sea
• 11. Archaic Chickengators: Amniotic Archosaur Ancestors of Dinosaurs and Birds
• 12. Coral Pigs and Tide Pool Sheep: Novel Selections of Behavior and Anatomy Epilogue. Femurs and Footprints: On the Trail of Megabeasts.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

Thinking whimsically makes serious science accessible. That's a message that should be taken to heart by all readers who want to learn about evolution. Do Elephants Have Knees? invites readers into serious appreciation of Darwinian histories by deploying the playful thinking found in children's books. Charles R. Ault Jr. weds children's literature to recent research in paleontology and evolutionary biology. Inquiring into the origin of origins stories, Ault presents three portraits of Charles Darwin-curious child, twentysomething adventurer, and elderly worm scientist. Essays focusing on the origins of tetrapods, elephants, whales, and birds explain fundamental Darwinian concepts (natural selection, for example) with examples of fossil history and comparative anatomy.The imagery of the children's story offers a way to remember and recreate scientific discoveries. By juxtaposing Darwin's science with tales for children, Do Elephants Have Knees? underscores the importance of whimsical storytelling to the accomplishment of serious thinking. Charles Darwin mused about duck beaks and swimming bears as he imagined a pathway for the origin of baleen. A "bearduck" chimera may be a stretch, but the science linking not just cows but also whales to moose through shared ancestry has great merit. Teaching about shared ancestry may begin with attention to Bernard Wiseman's Morris the Moose. Morris believes that cows and deer are fine examples of moose because they all have four legs and things on their heads. No whale antlers are known, but fossils of four-legged whales are. By calling attention to surprising and serendipitous echoes between children's stories and challenging science, Ault demonstrates how playful thinking opens the doors to an understanding of evolutionary thought.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

Wilder Lives uses ideas of `wildness' and `rewilding' to rethink human relationships with our environments in challenging but affirming ways. If the Earth is indeed 4.5 billion years old, as scientists currently tell us, recognisably human life has only been around since the last Ice Age, and as a species we have single-handedly destroyed our planet's ecosystems in the short space of a few hundred years, then we urgently need to reconsider and redefine our identities and behaviours. Can `thinking wild' help? Can it provide different ways of seeing, engaging, being human? Can we think of `wildness' as something that may exist in gradations, or as quality rather than absolute value, and as something that has important ethical as well as biological dimensions? Can it lead us to a `world view locating humans in a satisfactory residence on this historic and storied Earth', as Holmes Rolston (1988) suggests? Brown's argument in this book is wide-ranging, inquiring, challenging, but finally inspiring, and takes us through such questions as wildness and conservation, wild cities, rewilding language, wildness and food, wild animals, wild margins, and wildness in the ethics of human-animal relations.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Introduction: Miracles and Wonder 1 I EVERYTHING IS REGULATED 13
• 1 The Wisdom of the Body 15
• 2 The Economy of Nature 30 II THE LOGIC OF LIFE 47
• 3 General Rules of Regulation 51
• 4 Fat, Feedback, and a Miracle Fungus 73
• 5 Stuck Accelerators and Broken Brakes 89 III THE SERENGETI RULES 107
• 6 Some Animals Are More Equal than Others 111
• 7 Serengeti Logic 129
• 8 Another Kind of Cancer 155
• 9 Take 60 Million Walleye and Call Us in 10 Years 169
• 10 Resurrection 183 Afterword: Rules to Live By 202 Acknowledgments 215 Notes 217 Bibliography 239 Index 253.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

How does life work? How does nature produce the right numbers of zebras and lions on the African savanna, or fish in the ocean? How do our bodies produce the right numbers of cells in our organs and bloodstream? In The Serengeti Rules, award-winning biologist and author Sean Carroll tells the stories of the pioneering scientists who sought the answers to such simple yet profoundly important questions, and shows how their discoveries matter for our health and the health of the planet we depend upon. One of the most important revelations about the natural world is that everything is regulated-there are rules that regulate the amount of every molecule in our bodies and rules that govern the numbers of every animal and plant in the wild. And the most surprising revelation about the rules that regulate life at such different scales is that they are remarkably similar-there is a common underlying logic of life. Carroll recounts how our deep knowledge of the rules and logic of the human body has spurred the advent of revolutionary life-saving medicines, and makes the compelling case that it is now time to use the Serengeti Rules to heal our ailing planet. A bold and inspiring synthesis by one of our most accomplished biologists and gifted storytellers, The Serengeti Rules is the first book to illuminate how life works at vastly different scales. Read it and you will never look at the world the same way again.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Silent thunder
• The quiet path
• Hitting the road
• Urban wilderness
• Endangered quiet beauty
• The earth exposed
• The rocky road to quietude
• Nature's symphony in decline
• Toxic noise
• Seeking Muir's music
• Hundred-mile walk to Washington
• Washington, D.C.

• Prologue
• Roots and leaves
• Wood and knots
• Flowers and fruit
• Epilogue.

Jahren has built three laboratories in which she's studied trees, flowers, seeds, and soil. She tells about her childhood in rural Minnesota with an uncompromising mother and a father who encouraged hours of play in his classroom's labs; about how she found a sanctuary in science, and the disappointments, triumphs and exhilarating discoveries of scientific work. Yet at the core of this book is the story of a relationship Jahren forged with Bill, who becomes her lab partner and best friend. Their sometimes rogue adventures in science take them over the Atlantic to the ever-light skies of the North Pole and to tropical Hawaii, where she and her lab currently make their home.

• Prologue
• Roots and leaves
• Wood and knots
• Flowers and fruit
• Epilogue.

Jahren has built three laboratories in which she's studied trees, flowers, seeds, and soil. She tells about her childhood in rural Minnesota with an uncompromising mother and a father who encouraged hours of play in his classroom's labs; about how she found a sanctuary in science, and the disappointments, triumphs and exhilarating discoveries of scientific work. Yet at the core of this book is the story of a relationship Jahren forged with Bill, who becomes her lab partner and best friend. Their sometimes rogue adventures in science take them over the Atlantic to the ever-light skies of the North Pole and to tropical Hawaii, where she and her lab currently make their home.
An illuminating debut memoir of a woman in science; a moving portrait of a longtime friendship; and a stunningly fresh look at plants that will forever change how you see the natural world. Acclaimed scientist Hope Jahren has built three laboratories in which she's studied trees, flowers, seeds, and soil. Her first book is a revelatory treatise on plant life but it is also so much more. "Lab Girl" is a book about work, love, and the mountains that can be moved when those two things come together. It is told through Jahren's remarkable stories: about her childhood in rural Minnesota with an uncompromising mother and a father who encouraged hours of play in his classroom's labs; about how she found a sanctuary in science, and learned to perform lab work done with both the heart and the hands; and about the inevitable disappointments, but also the triumphs and exhilarating discoveries, of scientific work. Yet at the core of this book is the story of a relationship Jahren forged with a brilliant, wounded man named Bill, who becomes her lab partner and best friend. Their sometimes rogue adventures in science take them from the Midwest across the United States and back again, over the Atlantic to the ever-light skies of the North Pole and to tropical Hawaii, where she and her lab currently make their home. Jahren's probing look at plants, her astonishing tenacity of spirit, and her acute insights on nature enliven every page of this extraordinary book. "Lab Girl" opens your eyes to the beautiful, sophisticated mechanisms within every leaf, blade of grass, and flower petal. Here is an eloquent demonstration of what can happen when you find the stamina, passion, and sense of sacrifice needed to make a life out of what you truly love, as you discover along the way the person you were meant to be. -- Publisher description.

• Preface: What Is a Marine Biologist? vii Acknowledgments ix Apologia xi Prologue: The Perils of Teaching 1
• Chapter 1. Deadly Darts 3
• Chapter 2. The Great Jade Green Octopus Hunt 9
• Chapter 3. Bedtime Stories 20
• Chapter 4. Garden of Eden: The Death Apple and the Tree of Life 29
• Chapter 5. A True Romance Story 36
• Chapter 6. Elixir of Love 46
• Chapter 7. Skinny South Sea Sausages 52
• Chapter 8. The Only Male Reproductive Organ with a Name 59
• Chapter 9. Living Lance 66
• Chapter 10. Role Reversal 74
• Chapter 11. Super Male 83
• Chapter 12. Miracle Fish 89
• Chapter 13. Fugu 99
• Chapter 14. Bunnies of the Sea 107
• Chapter 15. Passion for Purple 116
• Chapter 16. Size Does Count 122
• Chapter 17. Fiddler on the Root 131
• Chapter 18. Beware the Duppy 138
• Chapter 19. The Secret of an Improved Sex Life 145
• Chapter 20. How to Court a Female 152
• Chapter 21. The Anti-BLB Club 159
• Chapter 22. Sea Pussy 166
• Chapter 23. Debunking the Big Lie 176
• Chapter 24. A Peek into the Anus of a Sea Cucumber 183
• Chapter 25. The Yellow Submarine 190
• Chapter 26. The Perils of Vanity 200
• Chapter 27. Sexually Repressed Victorian Taxonomists 206
• Chapter 28. Random Ramblings on Relationships 214
• Chapter 29. Penile Bloodletting 222
• Chapter 30. Death and Confusion 232
• Chapter 31. Eyeball to Eyeball 242 Epilogue 253 Glossary 257 Illustration Sources 264 Index 265.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

Learning marine biology from a textbook is one thing. But take readers to the bottom of the sea in a submarine to discover living fossils or to coral reefs to observe a day in the life of an octopus, and the sea and its splendors come into focus, in brilliant colors and with immediacy. In Sensuous Seas, Eugene Kaplan offers readers an irresistibly irreverent voyage to the world of sea creatures, with a look at their habitats, their beauty and, yes, even their sex lives. A marine biologist who has built fish farms in Africa and established a marine laboratory in Jamaica, Kaplan takes us to oceans across the world to experience the lives of their inhabitants, from the horribly grotesque to the exquisitely beautiful. In chapters with titles such as "Fiddler on the Root" (reproductive rituals of fiddler crabs) and "Size Does Count" (why barnacles have the largest penis, comparatively, in the animal kingdom), Kaplan ventures inside coral reefs to study mating parrotfish; dives 740 feet in a submarine to find living fossils; explains what results from swallowing a piece of living octopus tentacle; and describes a shark attack on a friend. The book is a sensuous blend of sparkling prose and 150 beautiful illustrations that clarify the science. Each chapter opens with an exciting personal anecdote that leads into the scientific exploration of a distinct inhabitant of the sea world--allowing the reader to experience firsthand the incredible complexity of sea life. A one-of-a-kind memoir that unfolds in remarkable reaches of ocean few of us can ever visit for ourselves, Sensuous Seas brings the underwater world back to living room and classroom alike. Readers will be surprised at how much marine biology they have learned while being amused.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

This work is the author's record of the time he spent in the remote area of the Australian rainforest and his run-ins with plant, animal and human species alike. He found hemself at the centre of a bitter battle over conservation strategies and became the object of many residents' hatred.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

In 1974 twenty-four-year-old Bill Sherwonit stepped into a whole new life - deep in the Alaska wild. In this engaging essay collection, Sherwonit recollects the adventures and trials of his more than thirty years in the Alaska wilderness.From the streets of Anchorage to wildlife preserves where wolves and bears freely roam, Sherwonit has witnessed the collision of man and nature firsthand in the untamed climes of Alaska. "Living with Wildness" constructs a continuum of 'wildness' with Sherwonit's lyrical writings, as he recounts intimate moments with the songbirds fluttering around his home birdfeeder and the halibut on his fishing line, as well as exciting experiences, including his close encounter with a grizzly bear and the breathtaking views of the northern lights in the remote North. Sherwonit discusses the cultural idea of the 'wild man' and meditates on his own efforts to spiritually connect with nature, noting that 'Wilderness is a place. Wildness, on the other hand, is a quality, a state of being.'A compellingly intimate and mesmerizing narrative, "Living with Wildness" reveals how we can engage with nature and access the wildness in our own selves.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

"Lulu Phezulu" (or 'Lulu on top') is the name of the home of Leigh ('Lulu') Voigt, the well-known artist and book illustrator who lives with her artist husband in the house they built for themselves on a mountain top in a nature reserve in Mpumalanga. This treasure of a book is at one level a personal account of her and her family's move from the city to the country and their serendipitous encounters with nature and the local people. It is also a breathtakingly beautiful natural history notebook filled with Leigh's watercolours and drawings as well as a wealth of anecdotes, curiosities, lore, and legend about the natural world. "Lulu Phezulu" has grown over many years out of Leigh's need to express, in both words and pictures, the bush and its fascination, highlighting the oddities and complexities of some of its engaging characters, both human and animal. It will appeal to all who have a love of nature and a love of life, both the ordinary and the extraordinary.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• The eagles
• The fault
• The plants
• The creek
• The stone
• The geese
• The bugs
• The weather
• The hills
• The invaders
• The water
• The crows
• Notes.

Naturalist and Seattle native David Williams offers his original perspectives on the wonder and resilience of nature in and around the Northwest's greatest population center. Illustrated by hand-drawn maps, Williams's writings are interesting, intelligent, and challenging at a personal level. He approaches the notion that his beloved city, as hip and urbane as it is, remains a wild place on the Northwest landscape-in the quarried rock of the historical buildings, in the branches of a pocket-sized city park, in the twists and turns of a stream that has been abused by polluters, hedged in by lawns, and buried under expressways. And yet it is a living thing, worthy of rescue. Williams looks beyond the skyline, beyond the postcard views of the Emerald City, and into its wild heart. Praise for The Seattle Street-Smart Naturalist: Like suddenly acquiring X-ray vision . . . Who knew that there was so much fascinating natural history crawling, flying, sprouting, flowing, drizzling, cawing, accreting, and sliding within the city limits of Seattle? Every page, every paragraph of Williams's book brought me revelations-not to mention the sheer pleasure of keeping company with such a sharp and enthusiastic writer. - David Laskin Author of The Children's Blizzard and Braving the Elements A passion for nature and the love of a chosen city combine seamlessly in David Williams's sharp-eyed ramble through Seattle. These beautifully told "field notes" of this inspired urban naturalist bring to life our streets and hills, our downtown edifices and suburban green pockets, on levels infinitely more profound than the everyday. - Ivan Doig Author of This House of Sky Raised in Seattle, David Williams is a general naturalist with a bachelor's degree in geology. As a Park Ranger and educator, he has taught natural history both in the field and in the classroom and has written widely on the topic for the last decade. He has written for Sunset, the Seattle Times, High Country News, National Parks, and Geotimes. Other books include A Naturalist's Guide to Canyon Country and Grand Views of Canyon Country, and he has contributed to Insight Guides: Seattle and Caves, Cliffs, and Canyons.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

The true tales in this collection will take readers from the chicken houses of Arkansas to the caves of Venezuela and Mexico to the coast of Alaska. These fifteen adventures range from amusing to life threatening. Some are filled with suspense and danger in exotic places, while others document more routine but important biological field and lab work.Meet the roommate with the rash that wouldn't go away, a friendly bull, some blind cave fish, killer whales, drug smugglers, and hairy roots that are used to produce new medicines. Read about researchers crawling through rotten-egg-smelling muck in search of an elusive mosquitofish, diving into the cold black water of the White River in search of mussels, flying with bush pilots in Alaska, and working with David Attenborough in Arkansas. Here are teachers and researchers, biologists all, all from one university, real people who get their feet wet and their hands dirty in the pursuit of knowledge.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)