Archipelago: Portraits of Life in the World's Most Remote Island Sanctuary

Book Description

For this project, Middleton and Liittschwager gained unprecedented access to photograph on and around these protected islands that are otherwise completely off-limits to people. Home to nearly seventy percent of our nation's coral reefs, known as the "rainforests of the sea," the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands is a remarkable ecosystem that supports a vast array of interdependent native plants and animals that have evolved in this habitat over millions of years, many existing nowhere else on the planet.

The result is Archipelago. With its more than 300 stunning images, the book illustrates the spectacular diversity of these ocean and island creatures, as well as profiles many of the people dedicated to the preservation of this habitat. The inaccessibility of these islands and the need to protect them means that few people will ever be able to visit them in person, though now, for the first time, the area's inhabitants are available for all the world to see through this important body of work. In conjunction with the publication of Archipelago, exhibitions of these photographs will be mounted in Honolulu and Washington, and will then travel to venues around the country throughout 2006.

Customer Reviews:

A Gorgeous Book, but Shoddy Packing.......2007-10-09

I've lived in Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge, where many of these photos were taken, for several months while working as a marine ecologist, so I've seen a large portion of these organisms, marine and terrestrial. Yet, despite the thousands of hours I've spent in the water there, Middleton and Liittschwager managed to find and photograph many organisms I've never seen before. Their photographs are unique because they mostly have a white background, so the organism is more starkly highlighted. Personally and as a marine ecologist, I think it's important to see the habitat and the other organisms that the organism may interact with, plus it's more interesting; however, that is what most fish or invertebrate books do and what any person with a camera or dive camera can do - Middleton and Liittschwager's technique is unique, much more difficult to accomplish, and therefore very special. Definitely a gorgeous book to keep on your coffee table - and a great way to see the organisms of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. One of my favorites is the group of images of one albatross growing up - from an egg to looking like an adult - I've always wanted to do that myself. This book will especially be a treasure for those lucky few who will visit Midway in the coming years as the new visitor program begins. I highly recommend it for those who have seen the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands and those who haven't but want to.

Secondly, somehow this book was not packed very well. Others before me have commented on this, and I agree. I've ordered lots of things from Amazon and never seen this before; however, for an expensive book with glossy covers that you don't want to get scratched, it really wasn't packed very well. However, my copy was not damaged in any way, so no worries. I just think Amazon should talk to whoever is packing these books!!

Not that good.......2007-02-03

Like most people I purchased this book to use as a coffee table book. Although this book does have some nice images in it. It does not have the wow factor that you would normally expect from a good coffee table book. I would suggest purchasing Ocean by Robert Dinwiddie. (ISBN 0756622050). That book is 1000 times better (in content, pictures, and volume of material), and will keep you entertained much longer.

Exquisite look at hidden world.......2007-01-05

The northwest Hawaiian islands, stretching all the way to Midway are rarely visited because of their remoteness and fragility. This beautiful book gives a comprehensive tour of the area. The coffee table format allows the strange lands and creatures to be seen at their best. The authors' skill and dedication to their topic shows clearly in both photos and text. Recommended for all nature lovers.

5 for the Book, 3 for the Shipping.......2006-08-16

Like the other reviewer, my book was improperly shipped, this time in a box too large so it sloshed around on its journey, getting dinged in the process.

However, the book itself is magnificent. It is a gorgeous, comprehensive collection of images detailing the flora and fauna of the Northwest Hawaiian Islands. This thriving Archipelago is beautiful in every sense of the word, and the intimate portraits that Middleton and LIttschwager have painstakenly produced of these creatures are superb. This is a jewel of a book, for photographic as well as conservationist reasons.

Beautiful book, inadequately packed.......2006-01-31

This is a magnificent book, with unique photgographs of sea creatures on white backgrounds. It would have made a splendid gift, except for the unfortunate fact that it was shipped in a box hardly bigger than itself and had obviously been dropped and crushed. Every page was dented, but it was too late to return it and get a new copy. One wonders why tiny objects are so often shipped in a box many times larger than themselves, but books like this one are tossed casually into the mail with no real protection at all.

Sampling Rare or Elusive Species: Concepts, Designs, and Techniques for Estimating Population Parameters

Average customer rating:

Very useful and illustrative!

Sampling Rare or Elusive Species: Concepts, Designs, and Techniques for Estimating Population Parameters

Manufacturer: Island Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1559634510

Book Description

Information regarding population status and abundance of rare species plays a key role in resource management decisions. Ideally, data should be collected using statistically sound sampling methods, but by their very nature, rare or elusive species pose a difficult sampling challenge.

Sampling Rare or Elusive Species describes the latest sampling designs and survey methods for reliably estimating occupancy, abundance, and other population parameters of rare, elusive, or otherwise hard-to-detect plants and animals. It offers a mixture of theory and application, with actual examples from terrestrial, aquatic, and marine habitats around the world.

Sampling Rare or Elusive Species is the first volume devoted entirely to this topic and provides natural resource professionals with a suite of innovative approaches to gathering population status and trend data. It represents an invaluable reference for natural resource professionals around the world, including fish and wildlife biologists, ecologists, biometricians, natural resource managers, and all others whose work or research involves rare or elusive species.

Customer Reviews:

Very useful and illustrative!.......2007-01-19

I usually work with very elusive animals like wild big cats, that's why I consider this book very useful and ilustrative if you are planning to work with rare species; in special the experimental desing section. Also the cited bibliography is a great tool to expand knowledge in this subjet. I really recomend it!!

Christian Estrada
Wildlife Biologist

Animal Underworld: Inside America's Black Market for Rare & Exotic Species

Average customer rating:

Disturbing, but solution is not practical
Wake up
A tragic and shocking truth
please contact me reasearch re- this book
The Only Good Pet Monkey is a Pet Sea Monkey

Animal Underworld: Inside America's Black Market for Rare & Exotic Species
Alan Green
Manufacturer: PUBLICAFFAIRS
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1891620282

Amazon.com

Zoos are places where animals are protected, kept safe from the ravages of the outside world and sheltered from extinction, right? Not necessarily, writes investigative reporter Alan Green, who takes his readers behind the bars in Animal Underworld to tell an unsettling tale of deception and cruelty.

That story opens at a zoo in northern Virginia, one of many such places around the United States in which black bears, once an exotic sight, have become a too-common commodity. Baby bears bring crowds, Green writes; unruly juveniles and listless adults do not. What happens to the bears who cannot contribute to the zoo's overhead? Animal sanctuaries are already overfull; individuals are not allowed to keep bears as pets without hard-to-obtain licenses; and bears raised in cages do not know how to fend for themselves in the wild. There is simply no place for them, Green writes, and the bears have economic worth only for their parts--the claws for jewelry, the flesh for restaurants, the paws for Asian apothecaries.

The nefarious means by which supposedly protected animals--many in danger of disappearing in the wild--are brought to market forms the heart of Green's disturbing report. Some of the country's most important zoos and museums turn up as villains in his pages, and readers will likely never visit such places again without wondering at the fate of the creatures that look out at them from the other side of the cage. --Gregory McNamee

Book Description

A vast and previously undisclosed underground economy exists in the United States. The products bought and sold: animals. In Animal Underworld, veteran investigative journalist Alan Green exposes the sleazy, sometimes illegal web of those who trade in rare and exotic creatures. Green and The Center for Public Integrity reveal which American zoos and amusement parks dump their "surplus" animals on the middlemen adept at secretly redirecting them into the private pet trade. We're taken to exotic-animal auctions, where the anonymous high bidders are often notorious dealers, hunting-ranch proprietors, and profit-minded charlatans masquerading as conservationists. We visit some of the nation's most prestigious universities and research laboratories, whose diseased monkeys are "laundered" through this same network of breeders and dealers until they finally reach the homes of unsuspecting pet owners. And we meet the men and women who make their living by skirting through loopholes in the law, or by ignoring the law altogether. For anyone who cares about animals; for pet owners, zoo-goers, wildlife conservationists, and animal welfare advocates, Animal Underworld is gripping, shocking reading.

Customer Reviews:

Disturbing, but solution is not practical.......2007-01-31

I have read most of this book. I volunteer at the same zoo.

I say I've only read most of the book because I found some parts so disturbing that I had to stop reading. The conditions of animals or the fact that some animals came from big animal parks only to be killed in canned hunts or the fact that some animals were trained to give a paw through a cage only to have the paw cut off and the animal bleed to death was too much for me to take.

So I've read most of the book and took away the horrifying message that not all zoos are telling you the truth. So I started asking detailed questions at the zoo I volunteer at (same one in the book that Mr. Green volunteered for and coincidentally the house right next to the one he volunteered in). When I started in 2000, I brought up my concerns about the animals that were being shipped all over the place and being taken in to the house. Since that time and since this book was published the Species Survival Plan and AZA management has been revitalized. There are distinct destinations for zoo animals. If someone says Lowry Park Zoo is getting a tiger, Lowry Park gets that tiger. Volunteers can even ask to accompany the animals to ensure they get to where they are supposed to be.
The message Mr. Green sends is that zoos should care for thier animals from cradle to grave. That isn't necessarily probable or beneficial for the animals. If you have a male elephant born at a zoo and it does not have a large enough enclosure for a male elephant, the zoo must transfer the animal to another place that has enough space. However, Mr. Green brings up an excellent point that AZA zoos should manage their animals closely from cradle to grave. There is no point in AZA accreditation if you don't have a way to manage animals that works.
Also, the U.S. Government must pay attention to this illegal trade. It makes close to the same amount of money as illegal drugs and there is still no legislation that funds APHIS enough to investigate this trade and shut it down. There is no legislation to stop the killing of wild animals in cages. There is no legislation barring the public from owning exotic animals without the education to care for the exotics. It is 2007 and still no one wants to look at the big elephant in the room.
I recommend this book for the information it has, but not for the solution it gives. Change can happen but by working with zoos, not by protesting them.

Wake up.......2007-01-30

I'm writing this review more as a response to the negative reviews posted here by proponents of the wild animal trade. Some have accused Green of poor research, or making blanket statements about zoos and the wildlife trade, which leads me to wonder if they've even read the book. In fact, one such reviewer admitted not reading it - talk about poor research.

The fact is, the author was a volunteer in one of our nation's most prestigious zoos, and simply became concerned about the animals that were continually being sent to other facilities. He began to research their whereabouts, and was horrified at what he found, prompting him to undertake further investigation.

The book specifically outlines the research and how it was conducted; Green followed paper trails, and that so many papers are forged and so many animals are simply traded illegally without proper paperwork made it a difficult task. Where the author was unable to follow up, he says so quite clearly. That so many of our nation's zoos are directly involved in furthering an animal welfare crisis should be a poor reflection on the zoos, not on the author who points it out.

As to the accusation that Green is trying to convince people that the wildlife trade is illegal, read the book again. He is very clear about what the laws are, and that lack of legislation, vague legislation, and under-staffed and under-funded government agencies are part of the problem. In fact, much of the difficulty in tracking down animals was a result of the incompetence of government agencies.

As an animal welfare professional, I frequently use this book as a reference, but I also do my own research (directly, not "3rd and 4th hand"), and it's very clear that the wild animal trade is out of control in this country, creating an animal welfare disaster and a very real threat to public health. Of course the exotic animal breeders, including those who have left reviews here, don't want you to read this book - it threatens their livelihood. If their real concern was animal welfare or conservation, they wouldn't be breeding animals and selling them for profit. Pay close attention to what they say - when they start talking about their rights as animal owners, it's clear whose welfare they're really concerned with. My personal opinion is that simply being human does not endow us with the natural right to possess wild animals, and there are plenty of ethical ways to enjoy them and even profit from them without exploiting or abusing them.

I also must question the integrity of a person who would read a book cover to cover in a book store rather than paying for it. Would you want people to abuse your exotic animals without paying for them first? Try the library next time.

No book is perfect, but this one is worth your time. Don't just take what it says at face value - do your own research; check out the facilities Green mentions; try to follow some of the paper trails yourself; go to an accredited wildlife sanctuary and ask where the animals came from. Then draw your own conclusions, and decide what role you'll play.

A tragic and shocking truth.......2007-01-14

To those of us who don't always hear the truth about what happens to exotic animals in the "pet" trade, in zoos, at hunting parks, or other places, this book is a wonderfully enlightening read. Meticulously researched, the author uncovers what really happens to the thousands of animals that end up as surplus from zoos and other breeders. You might think twice before visiting an exotic game park or zoo after reading this book. Other readers who breed exotic animals for profit as pets overlook the point that the author is trying to make: wild animals are not domesticated animals, nor should they be ripped out of the wild, bred, sold and bought for a profit. The horrible lives in small cages that many of these animals endure is not worth the "fun" one might have viewing them at a zoo or keeping them as a pet. Exotic animals do not make good pets and would be better off in the wild with their own kind, rather than behind our cage bars for our viewing pleasure.

please contact me reasearch re- this book.......2006-05-29

I have read all your reviews with great interest i am a student in the u.k studying BSc (Hons) Animal Behaviour i will be starting my final year in sept 06 and during the summer holiday i will carrying out research for my final dissertation project and i would like to hear from anyone who has experience of owning an exotic species or who knows someone that has.I would like to hear from the vet teche in florida regarding state laws there but no email address on your amazon profile. I can be contacted on imartra@hotmail.com or on MSN messenger. thanks Catherine

The Only Good Pet Monkey is a Pet Sea Monkey.......2004-01-17

There is no doubt that there is a huge, lucrative, underground trade in exotics, and that many of the people involved in it are unethical scumbags. Of course, not ALL individuals who own exotic pets are nasty: some of them are conscientious and care enough to be well-informed about the species they choose to own.

But the author of this book provides an important service to the public. Green sheds light into the dark corners of the exotics business, part of which involves shuffling zoo and research animals to canned hunt facilities or roadside petting zoos. It all works through middlemen who assure legitimate keepers that their surplus animals are going to qualified handlers, when in fact they are often laundered through pet auctions or given to animal collectors who abandon them at the first sign of difficult behavior or ill health.

Take monkeys and apes. They're cute and smart, but mishandling can create a strong, deranged primate that will pose very real risks to anyone not familiar with their needs. Also, they harbor all kinds of diseases that are a direct threat to public health, and some that haven't jumped the species barrier yet but, in the future, may do so. Hardly any sanctuaries exist that can care for them once they are no longer needed for research or public display. What should we, as a society that frowns on animal cruelty, do for them?

Anyone who is interested in exotics, animal-based research, or even visiting the zoo should read this book. Yes, Green almost exclusively discusses the creepy side of the issue. But he also describes some very ethically-run sancutaries and some individuals in the zoo and research sectors who truly care for their charges' welfare.

As for owning exotic pets, I personally think there are some people who actually are qualified to do so. Who decides those qualifications? That's another issue. Also, "exotics" include everything from hedgehogs and sugar gliders to tigers and the great apes. I've owned the former two, and found them to be sweet little companion animals. (But if someone offered me a giraffe, I'm afraid I would have to decline.) Not all exotics are totally inappropriate for all people. But some exotics are totally inappropriate for most people.

Book Description

The hardy, multipurpose Dominique chickens that came to the New World with the Pilgrims and later traveled in pioneer saddlebags to help settle the West were once too numerous to count; by 1990 a mere 500 hens survived. This is but a single example of the diminishing diversity of farm animals: half of once-common livestock breeds are endangered, others are already extinct. The need to preserve farm animal diversity is increasingly urgent, says the author of this definitive book on endangered breeds of livestock and poultry. Farmyard animals may hold critical keys for our survival, Jan Dohner warns, and with each extinction, genetic traits of potentially vital importance to our agricultural future or to medical progress are forever lost. This comprehensive book features: complete information on the history, characteristics, qualities, and traits of 138 endangered livestock breeds (goats, sheep, swine, cattle, horses, other equines) and 53 poultry breeds (chickens, turkeys, ducks, geese); where these breeds may be seen today; the degree of rarity of each breed in the United States, United Kingdom and Canada; information on feral livestock populations; 160 color photographs and over 80 black and white photos and historical illustrations

Customer Reviews:

Wondrous source book.......2005-09-15

An eyeopening look at the diversity of livestock we may lose if we're not careful. Looking for stock that has survived the test of time, but has been left behind in the handful of homogenized varieties beloved by big farming? This is the book for you! This book is a must have for recreation and historical groups throughout the states, and I firmly recommend it.

Full of interesting information!.......2003-05-11

Ms. Dohner has written a well-researched book on a topic that has begun to catch the attention of many -- historic (and now rare) breeds of livestock. In the past, people dug up roots and bulbs from the old family homestead and transplanted them to new locations. They could go to grandpa and get some of those "dominicker" chickens that his daddy started with.

For many, the homestead and the dominickers are gone now, just like the items the Smithsonian that were once part of every day life. But for some, like the author, "dominickers" and other historic livestock are still a part of life on the farm.

Perhaps that is why Jan Dohner has been able to write a very readable book, giving the reader the profiles and histories of over 200 breeds of poultry and other livestock (goats, sheep, swine, cattle, horses, other equines)and even accounts of their original domestication along with their current status. The illustrations only add to the text.

Customer Reviews:

Yes, We Will Miss Them!.......2000-02-16

I read this book for the first time in my English Block in college. I read this book and I was amazed that a sixth grader could compose something so wonderful and informative. It really enlightens students to know that there are authors that are their ages. It is on a level that students can understand. Furthermore (I think)this book can be used beyond the middle schools and into higher education to let others know what's going on in nature.

Average customer rating:

Rare and endangered plants of Oregon
Donald C Eastman
Manufacturer: Beautiful America Pub. Co
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Can We Save Them? Endangered Species of North America

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Can We Save Them? Endangered Species of North America
David Dobson
Manufacturer: Charlesbridge Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0881068225

Book Description

People have always like changing their environment. We have built roads, bridges, houses, cities, and factories. Some of these "improvements" have damaged the natural habitats of the animals and plants that lived there first.

Book Description

David Liittschwager and Susan Middleton have established a reputation as the foremost chroniclers of the endangered natural world, combining rigorous methodology with aesthetic genius. Their work has afforded a vivid presence to rare animals and plants, many of which are threatened with extinction.

This groundbreaking portfolio of photographs encompasses the spectacular array of life-forms endemic to the Hawaiian Islands, including species either new to science or previously thought to be extinct.

Working with internationally renowned field biologists, Liittschwager and Middleton have ventured into remote native habitats and uncovered intact ecosystems where plants and animals still live in healthy relationship to one another. Their inaccessibility has helped protect these habitats from damage, even if it means that few people will ever have the opportunity to experience their richness and value directly.

Remains of a Rainbow combines Liittschwager's and Middleton's work with a powerful text (including a foreword by Pulitzer Prize-winning writer W.S. Merwin) to tell a story of rare and wondrous creatures and habitats and the people devoted to their preservation.

Customer Reviews:

Beautiful Book.......2007-01-19

We first saw the hard-back version of this book in the museum on the island of Kauai. We thought it was a wonderful hardback book, but the museum tols us that it could cost $150.00 and was no longer available in any form. Luckily we found it on Amazon in soft cover (which is more than adequate) and for much less money. Truely a beautiful and informative book!

Pretty pictures but don't trust the text.......2006-11-08

The pictures of rare Hawaiian plants and animals in "Remains of a Rainbow" are pretty.
Pretty uninformative. And the text is largely nonsense.
The tipoff is "rich volcanic soil." When you see that in a book about Hawaiian natural history, you know right away that the author made no effort to learn his subject.
Just a few paragraphs away, we run into a rhapsody about the ancient Hawaiians' respect for the "unity and balance of the natural world." Large, slow, tasty birds excepted, of course.
The text by photographers David Liitschwager and Susan Middleton (assisted by Maui poet W.S. Merwin in an ill-informed introduction) is the verbal equivalent of kudzu -- an exotic, boring growth that smothers the interesting natural stuff underneath. Green goo.
It is understandable why the sponsors of "Remains" -- Environmental Defense and the National Geographic Society -- pander this way. It is not so easy to sell Hawaii's endangered plants and animals on their merits. After all, you and I are not likely ever to encounter most of them.
Which raises a question: If none of us is going to meet them except in the pages of a book, why bother to preserve them in nature? A small herb that was never known to exist until three or four years ago, and which was down to maybe five or 10 individuals then, is not going to alter the islands' ecosystem if it disappears.
One answer to that question is the last word in this book, taken from the writings of the late Maui biologist Wayne Gagne: "We are in pursuit of environmental quality, an ethical stance where our native biota is concerned, and for accepting each natural ecosystem on the planet for what it is . . . each a unique result of multifaceted ecological processes, past, present and continuing."
Fine words, but Liittschwager, Middleton and their sponsors obviously do not believe they can sell them. So instead of marketing Hawaii for what it is -- a unique place -- they peddle the ecological situation here, which is grim enough in fact, as part of a crisis "of declining biodiversity worldwide."
This is the "sixth great extinction" argument, one of those resilient popular ideas for which there is little evidence. People holding such views can find themselves in paradoxical situations.
Middleton, who blows the tin horn of mass extinctions louder than Liittschwager, writes about how after 15 years of working with endangered species, none she had encountered had yet gone extinct. Until Clermontia peleana.
But it turns out that while Clermontia peleana, a Big Island plant, probably is extinct in the wild, it is not yet quite extinct from the Earth.
Middleton does not seem to find any contradiction in simultaneous belief that the world is in the midst of the biggest extinction crisis in 65 million years and the fact that even a specialist in endangered species has yet to encounter one that passed on.
Considering that outsiders Liittschwager and Middleton had the cooperation of dozens of Hawaii's best biologists, they could easily have done better.
For one thing -- and this is another tipoff that the writers have not done their homework -- if they had listened to local experts, they would not have made such a big deal of Hawaii's biological diversity. To call islands with no amphibians, no reptiles, no pines and no ants diverse is perverse.
Instead of revealing and reveling in Hawaii's strange status -- its untypical ecological situation makes it the greatest natural laboratory of evolution -- Liitschwager and Middleton went for the picturesque and shallow.
Their pictures are gorgeous but don't tell much. They mostly were shot against solid backgrounds and display only a part of the organism. There is little hint of how each species functions within its community.
The misleading text of Liittschwager and Middleton is somewhat corrected by thumbnail descriptions of the 142 species illustrated, which were written by local authorities and are reliable.
"Remains of a Rainbow" represents the work of years, with the combined support for publishing from Environmental Defense, the National Tropical Botanical Garden and The Nature Conservancy of Hawaii; along with the on-the-ground help of NTBG, Maui Land & Pineapple Co. and other public-spirited groups.
In an afterword, David Wilcove, senior ecologist of Environmental Defense, writes that the survival of species in desperate straits will rely on "above all, public education."
"Remains of a Rainbow" is so far from contributing to public education that readers will end up knowing less about Hawaii after reading the book than they did before.

Don't get me wrong............2006-01-18

Now don't get me wrong. This is a wonderful book with beautiful photographs of Native Plants and Animals of Hawaii. The only thing wrong with the Softcover version is that the cover creases so easily. So if you want this book for your own personal library the Hardcover version is preferred. But if it is used as it is meant to be, as a coffee table book, than this is the book to have.

WOW, WOW, WOW, WOW.......2003-02-25

WOWS on every page. I gave this book to my Mother and Aunt for X-Mass. I wanted one for myself but ran out of cash (dag nab it) This is one of the most AMAZING nature books ever. If you need some brownie points give this as a gift, it will keep you out of the Dog House for YEARS.

Spectacular Photographs.......2002-04-28

This book contains some of the most spectacular photographs you've seen. Close-ups even a pro would seldom come close to. It's unlikely you'll see many of these in your travels, but it feels like your walking through a Hawaiian tropical jungle as you page through the book. Many of the pages would look great framed for your walls. This is the perfect coffee table book, all of my friends have picked it up and marveled over the interesting plants and flowers, even the non-gardeners.

Rare Bird: Pursuing the Mystery of the Marbled Murrelet

Average customer rating:

A rare bird who managed to keep its nesting place undetected for nearly two centuries
A Page Turner!
Coaxing a non-birder into the old growth forest
Great Bird, Great Book!

Rare Bird: Pursuing the Mystery of the Marbled Murrelet
Maria Mudd Ruth
Manufacturer: Rodale Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1594860904
Release Date: 2005-05-12

Book Description

Part naturalist detective story, part environmental inquiry, this vibrant narrative celebrates the fascinating world of an endangered seabird that depends on the contested old-growth forests of the Pacific Northwest for its survival 'This chunky little seabird stole my heart.' So confesses Maria Mudd Ruth, a veteran nature writer perfectly happy to be a generalist before getting swept up in the strange story of the marbled murrelet. This curiosity of nature, who flies like a little brown bullet at up to 100 miles an hour and lives most of its life offshore, is seen around land only during breeding season, when the female lays a single egg high on a mossy tree limb in the ancient coastal forest.

Customer Reviews:

A rare bird who managed to keep its nesting place undetected for nearly two centuries.......2005-10-12

If you haven't heard of the marbled murrelet, even if you're an avid birder, don't be surprised: it's a rare bird who managed to keep its nesting place undetected for nearly two centuries: one explored in depth in Rare Bird: Pursuing The Mystery Of The Marbled Murrelet. Like the more famous ivory-billed woodpecker, the marbled murrelet is an elusive bird which has chosen exclusively a limited territory depleted trough logging. Though not on the edge of extinction, the many human threats to its habitat are reducing its numbers, and naturalist author Maria Mudd Ruth here explores these influences - and her discoveries about an amazing bird.

A Page Turner!.......2005-07-15

This is a wonderful book! An interesting read for both the avid bird watcher or the casual observer. I loved this book!

Coaxing a non-birder into the old growth forest.......2005-06-12

What is remarkable about Rare Bird is how accessible and interesting it is for a non-scientist and non-birder. Maria Ruth Mudd's ability to draw the reader close to this fascinating, endangered and shy sea bird that nests in old growth forests comes in part from her own outsider perspective-she calls herself an "accidental naturalist"-as well as her lively explanations detailing how scientists began to learn about and understand this odd creature.

From rich and poetic descriptions of old growth forests where this bird nests, to humorous and arduous accounts of tagging along with ornithologists, field biologists, and other tireless birders attempting to study the marbled murrelet, Ruth Mudd brings the reader into a world seldom even contemplated by most. She also demonstrates-- through historical record, numerous anecdotes detailing her own growing curiosity, and descriptions of the fascinating fieldwork--just how difficult studying this bird is, as well as how crucial the marbled murrelet researchers are to this bird's survival. As much as this book is a natural history, it is a song of appreciation to the researchers who have dedicated their lives to understanding and fighting for endangered species in general, and this bird in particular.

By the end of the book, I cared about this strange-looking auk, I wanted to hug the researchers that work to document the impact of polluted waters and clear-cutting on this bird's survival, and I better understood the plight of one endangered bird in a world hungry for old growth trees and land.

Great Bird, Great Book!.......2005-06-09

I have had the pleasure of reading Maria Mudd Ruth's most recent book,Rare Bird: Pursuing the Mystery of the Marbled Murrelet. This book is the result of years of research by the author, which included culling facts from many scientific papers and journals,interviewing numerous biologists and ornithologists,visiting museums,attending seabird conferences and participating in data collection herself. The result is a lively,intelligent,thoughtful,funny and easily readable tale of a most unusual bird,and the folks who have found it fascinating. The author's enthusiasm for this bird is evident in her personal narration. This is no dry scientific paper. We, as readers, are amazed by the number of people who over so many years have dedicated their lives to studying this elusive creature,and the lengths they go to to observe and record it's behavior. We are also moved as we consider how difficult is the mission of maintaining the delicate balance of nature and industry in our increasingly complex world. Ruth has given us a gift in this detailed account of a funny ,fat, little bird and the stir it has caused, while trying to avoid attention altogether. It's a must read for those concered with protecting threatened and endangered species, and for those of us who enjoy a story well told.

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