Book Description

Still a revolutionary concept, this Web-enhanced book Living with the Earth: Concepts in Environmental Health Science, Second Edition continues the standard of excellence that earned the first edition the CHOICE award for Outstanding Academic Book in 1999. It incorporates traditional concepts in environmental and health science with new, emerging, and controversial issues associated with environmental threats to human health and ecology. In addition, the Web site, maintained by the author, gives you a technological edge.HERE'S WHAT YOU GET IN TEXT:·Accurate infographic illustrations such as 3-D bar charts, 3-D pie charts, and detailed maps·Tables designed using the most recently available dataHERE'S THE WEB ADVANTAGE:·Words from the World with comments and information from students and professionals around the globe·Live chatroom with the author during the semester·Test bank and study questions giving a thorough understanding of the concepts covered·Microsoft PowerPoint presentation slides in digital formatThe author presents a balanced and objective picture of opposing scientific views on major issues ranging from global warming and the Greenhouse Effect to reproductive problems associated with endocrine disruptors. More than 280 richly detailed graphs, charts, figures, and photographs put the information right at your fingertips. The glossary provides over 300 definitions and a section on acronyms and abbreviations. Kept current via the author's Web site, this is a "living" environmental health book, reflecting the latest information. The Web site is classroom tested, and designed to maximize the use of the Living with the Earth as a text, training tool, or resource for professionals. ... Read more

Book Description

A dramatic story of the interplay between environment and economy in New England. ... Read more

Reviews (37)

Of Indians, ships, shoes, wood pulp, steam and oysters
Author Diana Muir resides on Bullough's Pond in Newton, Massachusetts, a few miles west of the Boston city center. From this vantage point, she's written REFLECTIONS IN BULLOUGH'S POND, a history of the manner in which the human residents of New England have exploited their environment, first for simple survival, then economic gain, from the time of the paleo-hunters 10,000 years ago to the present.

In hardcover, REFLECTIONS is not a particularly thick volume - exclusive of Notes and Index, only 258 pages. However, the print is small and the scope large. There are also a large number of maps, charts, graphs, drawings, and b/w photos to break up the text and give the reader's eyes some variety. The list of topics is the roadmap of the region's economic development, diversification, and spotty decline: the evolution of farming from hunting/gathering, the native Indians' use of forest and fauna, the arrival of the Europeans and the extermination of the area's tribes by disease, Yankee shipbuilding and ocean commerce, land shortages, and the advent of sawmills and shoemaking. Further into the book, one reads about itinerant peddlers, ice exports, the expansion of roads/canals/railroads, machines that make other machines..., the production of charcoal, and the disappearance of indigenous animal species.... Then, as the Industrial Revolution takes firm grip, one learns of cotton mills, steam power, the grinding-up of the forests by the paper mills, the rise and fall (due to water pollution) of oyster harvesting, and the fishing industry, especially King Cod. Finally, Ms. Muir laments the deleterious changes in the ecosystem brought on by acid rain, the increase in greenhouse gasses, and the losses of topsoil andozone.

... Diana has produced a scholarly, excellently researched book that's consistently informative and interesting. (It's also only rarely entertaining in the sense of being fun, so, if that's the requirement, perhaps the latest potboiler from Grisham, King or Cornwell is a better choice of the moment.)

As I recall, it was an email from Ms. Muir that brought REFLECTIONS to my attention. She'd read another of my reviews on Amazon, and thought her book might appeal to me. Thank you, Diana, for your leap of faith.

New England As Seen Through Bullough's Pond
Diana Muir has written a thoughtful and well-researched book about the history of the eco-systems of New England through the lens of her life and experiences at Bullough's Pond. Lest the reader suppose that this book is related in some way to a famous predecessor also written from the viewpoint of a life by a pond, let me allay those prejudgments right here and now. Walden was a philosophical tract while Diana Muir has penned a rather enjoyable history of the ecology of New England and how it was changed (not necessarily for the better) by each wave of human settlers.

She finds the habitat fragile from the start, due to the climate and location. Each wave of human settlers has changed the environment. As the population of the first settlers, American Indians grew past what the land was able to sustain, deforestation and agriculture began as maize and beans became important sources of food. Fishing was also a way of life, particularly oyster harvesting. When settlers arrived from Europe they found land friendly to agriculture, but over-farming and poor land management doomed the thin topsoil. Fishing would later join agriculture on New England's endangered list; even the oyster was soon gone, a victim of overfishing.

But Ms. Muir's story is also one of pure Yankee inventiveness. Industry soon took the major role and, helped by waves of immigration from Europe, made New England a major player in America's economy, providing the manufactured goods needed by the North to win the Civil War. And it was New England's ecology that supplied the backbone for the industrial revolution through the use of water power. The price New England paid for that was the polllution of these very power sources, making them unfit for drinking, or life.

As the rest of America caught up with New England, new technologies emerged to give her a new foothold in America's economy, but the ecological problems remained the same. Her solutions, as seen from her foothold in Bullough's Pond, are not new, but are based in thoughtful reflection, unlike some other solutions I have seen, and bear reflection.

Except for the chapter on the waterways, where she descends into a jeremiad, stating the all-too-obvious, this is a restrained book that lets the facts speak for themselves. Especially delightful, and to the point, is her description of the dredging of the pond by the county due in large part to Winter run-offs. One note of warning: the writing style is such that once you pick it up, you'll find it hard to put down.

See many more reviews
Reviews from newspapers, magazines, and academic journals are posted at: www.DianaMuir.com

Not just for New Englanders
Other reviewers have discussed the virtues of the book, so I will only add that the lessons to be learned from this well written and fascinating study are relevant to the entire planet, not just New England. As such, the book is highly recommended to anyone anywhere who is interested in mankind's relationship to the environment and its effects on culture and economics.

An Intriguing Glimpse at New England¿s History
Using a pond near her home in Newton, MA as a backdrop, Diana Muir weaves a compelling view of New England history, which she argues is a series of ecological crises.

From pre-Columbian times, Muir says, New England was populated by individuals struggling on a land that was not conducive to making a living. Radical solutions to unsolvable problems were their only escape. In the 1790s, when farming was the only occupation, a growing population and a soil spent by generations of misuse, resulted in a dearth of farmable land. With no prospects and no future, individuals like Eli Whitney and Thomas Blanchard, were forced to look for creative solutions to society's problems and set in motion an industrial revolution.

I was particularly intrigued by the story of Frederick Tudor, the man who in 1806 introduced ice to Martinique. It is one thing to sell ice to people who because of their location, understand the concept. It is quite another, to sell ice to people who have never experienced it, to say nothing about the practical necessities of ice houses to warehouse the product.

His father's real estate speculation losses left Tudor with nothing but ambition and a house with a pond in Saugus, MA. He succeeded after two difficult decades. There was always a wrinkle to be solved before a fortune could be built. Iceboxes had to be designed and then marketed in southern ports to people who had to be taught how to preserve it.

This phenomenon explains why there so many Crystal and Silver Lakes dot the New England landscape, relics of an enterprising age. Savvy ice dealers understood that attractive names sell products. For a brief period even Muir's Bullough's Pond was briefly renamed Silver Lake.

Diana Muir e-mailed me twice during the past two years introducing her book to me. Having read her book, I am grateful for her persistence. If you enjoy reading unique looks at our history, I implore not to wait for her to contact you. Read her book; you will not regret it. ... Read more

Book Description

Reviews (16)

Blood orchid
As the Hammer Orchid seduces its prey with false promises of satisfaction, Charles Bowden draws his readers into his own personal saga of pain with an impressive display of anger and wrath. Multitudes of partially coherent and mostly unrelated images of sex and war are thrown to the reader at a steadily unrelenting pace, leaving one with the choice of either leaving them at the table, or ingesting them wholly and accepting the emotional heartburn that will accompany the feast. For those who choose the path of greater resistance, the rewards will follow. A highly recommended but particularly difficult read, intended for those with a passionate devotion to nature, man, history and their shared bonds.

"Blood orchids. Everywhere."
In the introduction to his 298-page book, Charles Bowden tells us, "I wrote this book because I had a simple, straightforward idea--we've been in a long war and we've lost that war and the war has poisoned us and our ground. If we admit these facts, we might survive. If we don't, it really won't matter if we survive because we will be functionally dead. Pick up any newspaper, our obituary is everywhere on the pages" (p. xiv). Bowden's prose is powerful, prophetic, hallucinogenic, and poetic. Although Bowden is not always easy to follow, he is worth the effort. In BLOOD ORCHIDS, he looks deeply into "the history of America" to discover "our governments are sick and that we are mentally ill and spiritually dead and that all our issues and crises are symptoms of this deeper sickness" (p. 139). After you've experienced this book, read Bowden's more recent BLUES FOR CANNIBALS.

G. Merritt

Blood Orchid gets hammered.
Blood Orchid is filled and covered with blood. But blood brings healing. It is hard to write a good review when I have some mixed feelings about this book. I have read a few books with similar topics this past summer and they leave me numb, but I am captivated by Bowden's metaphor, whether I like it or not. He definitely has a way with words and word pictures.

In the midst of his openness and honesty he sounds as if he is regurgitating a bitter pill someone has given him to swallow. This makes the book even more compelling and hard to put down, always returning to the lesson in botany and zoology provided by the wasp and the hammer orchid. After all, are we not biological beings also? Is not everything connected by a thin cord? It is like the picture of Coyote Man being the trickster and the tricked, with irony everywhere.

7,000 miles to coherency
Blood Orchid is a work that defies categorization, it is as much a history of America as it is a piece of philosophy. Bowden writes in his introduction, "I have clocked 7,000 miles by truck in the last thirty days and I am hunkered in a motel room high in the Rocky Mountains and yet no nearer to God." Nor to a concrete point either it would seem. Bowden writes about war, and how we go about perpetuating our own destruction through it. It is in this social critique that I see Bowden's rant moving with a purpose. That purpose is to reveal life for what it really is, and he does so successfully. Blood Orchid is a piece of philosophy of life, albeit a fairly depressing one, Bowden writes about life as we have made it, and in that does an excellent job.

A wild ride
I'd be lying if I said this was an easy read, but Bowden warns the reader from the beginning that he travels fast. The subject matter is more than brutal and disturbing. It is enough to make you regret that you are a human being, but I am not sure that Bowden's goal is too make you feel hopeless. In many ways he is optimistic about the future in spite of the bloody past he graphically offers to the reader. He wants to move beyond explaining the past because as he says, "What is explained can be denied but what is felt cannot be forgotten." It would be impossible to read this book and not feel something, but the bigger sin in Bowden's eyes would be forgetting what you felt. The rawness and 85 mph pace of the prose alone makes this a difficult book to forget, but the subject matter and content moves you to question the deeper issues that plague a society that has forgotten how to feel, how to love, and how to live. I found portions of the book difficult to grasp and the book is mentally and emotionally exhausting in many ways. This does not diminish the importance of Bowden's message, but as a reader you need to be prepared to spend some time digesting the material. ... Read more

Book Description

In this book environmentalist and lawyer William Shutkin describes a new kind of environmental and social activism spreading across the nation, one that joins the pursuit of environmental quality with that of civic health and sustainable local economies. In the face of challenges posed by often corrosive market forces and widespread social disaffection, this civic environmentalism is creating nothing less than a new public discourse and dynamic social vision grounded in environmental action.

Shutkin points the way to vibrant, sustainable communities through four inspiring examples of civic environmentalism in action: the redevelopment of contaminated urban land for agriculture in inner-city Boston, mass-transit-based development and waterfront restoration in Oakland, protection of open space and conservation-based development in rural Colorado, and smart-growth and sustainability strategies in suburban New Jersey. The book's underlying message is that the nation's environmental health is a critical factor in its success as a vital democracy. Social health, democratic community, and environmentalism, Shutkin shows, are one. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

relief from the gloom-and-doom
Not that Shutkin fails to understand how serious our environmental problems are. He knows. This is no Polyanna-style tale a la Greg Easterbrook, telling lies about how trivial environmental degradation is in order to sell books. Shutkin ralizes that our problems are serious, even life-threatening. But he thinks that we can begin to resolve them, if only we can find the will to begin, rather in the style of Diana Muir in her new book Bullough's Pond. Some of his solutions may not be workable, but surely Shutkin is correct to urge us to try.

A lyrical and compelling work -- though somewhat Utopian
Bill Shutkin's sensitivity to the environment and the human dimension of ecological concerns shines through brilliantly in this book. The case studies which are at the core of his narrative and his exposition of environmental problems are well-researched, and well-experienced. As an activist/lawyer/entrepreneur/academic, Shutkin provides an unusual blend of insights which are indeed rare in environmental literature.

Optimism permeates this book which is certainly refreshing to many readers who are probably tired of the gloom and doom that resonates from many green texts. The foreword by David Brower is perhaps a prelude to this optimism and to the change in perception and outlook concerning environmental policy among activists.

Nevertheless, the primacy of this change in contemporary times is perhaps overstated by Shutkin. I was somewhat disappointed with the Amero-centric nature of the text, particularly when it comes to the poetic celebration of so global an issue as environmentalism. By this I do not mean the case selection - which is quite appropriate considering Shutkin's own expertise in working with certain communities. Rather, I am more concerned with the way in which the "reforms" within civic society are heralded as a hallmark of American democracy. Indeed, the work of the Austrian / British economist and thinker E.F. Schumacher (who died in the seventies) are not even mentioned. Much of the community oriented "small is beautiful" approach which is at the core of Shutkin's argument can be found there (and elsewhere), and has been in motion for decades.

I think that the book should have perhaps been less ambitious in its title and argument by focusing on a certain class of environmental concerns where a sense of place and association with the land can be imbibed. It is important for all of us to consider that there are also many environmental concerns, where such associations are impossible to foster - many global environmental issues such as climate change, ozone depletion or other scientifically dependent areas of environmental concerns which do indeed require a certain intellectual "elite" and an elaborate decision-making apparatus. Let us also not forget that even at the community level and the urban planning level, many of the great success stories of environmental reform have worked with strong top-down approaches - Singapore being a living example. Also, what is one to do when civic environmentalism does not emerge even within a democratic process? The book should have perhaps addressed such anomalies to the argument.

Despite these minor shortcomings, this book is a momentous achievement which will undoubtedly spur much reflection and debate.

The Land that Will Be (if we become more civically active)
This is one of the most inspiring books I have read in years. When I choose to read a non-fiction book, which is rather infrequently, this is exactly the kind of book I hope for -- engaging from the first page on, well-researched, analytical, passionate and ultimately deeply meaningful. The environmental movement has had a rather narrow audience historically, but this book -- because of its basic premise that the environment is inextricably linked to all facets of our lives and because of the author's embracing style -- could serve to open up the field a great deal more. As I was reading this book, I felt a deep sense that there really is no other way to approach the significant environmental problems facing us than the way Shutkin promotes (through grass-roots citizen coalitions). I found this realization not to be burdensome but to be profoundly uplifting. Shutkin's case studies of successful civic environmentalism prove that democracy is alive and well in certain communities in our country and that, indeed, the grass will always be greener in America if more of us exercise our personal power to keep it that way. ... Read more

Book Description

"A fascinating account of inner and outer exploration and discovery in one of the last remote regions of the world - sharp-eyed, insightful, candid, and well written. "Peter Matthiessen, author of The Snow Leopar.

In 1993, Alan Rabinowitz, called "the Indiana Jones" of wildlife science by The New York Times, arrived for the first time in the country of Myanmar, known until 1989 as Burma, uncertain of what to expect. Working under the auspices of the Wildlife Conservation Society, his goal was to establish a wildlife research and conservation program and to survey the country's wildlife. He succeeded beyond all expectations, not only discovering a species of primitive deer completely new to science but also playing a vital role in the creation of Hkakabo Razi National Park, now one of Southeast Asia's largest protected areas.

Beyond the Last Village takes the reader on a journey of exploration, danger, and discovery in this remote corner of the planet at the southeast edge of the Himalayas where tropical rain forest and snow-covered mountains meet. As we travel through this "lost world"-a mysterious and forbidding region isolated by ancient geologic forces-we meet the Rawang, a former slave group, the Taron, a solitary enclave of the world's only pygmies of Asian ancestry, and Myanmar Tibetans living in the furthest reaches of the mountains. We enter the territories of strange, majestic-looking beasts that few people have ever heard of and fewer have ever seen-golden takin, red goral, blue sheep, black barking deer. The survival of these ancient species is now threatened, not by natural forces but by hunters with snares and crossbows, trading body parts for basic household necessities.

The powerful landscape and unique people the author befriends help him come to grips with the traumas and difficulties of his past and emerge a man ready to embrace the world anew. Interwoven with his scientific expedition in Myanmar, and helping to inform his understanding of the people he met and the situations he encountered, is this more personal journey of discovery. ... Read more

Reviews (8)

Wonderful Story
I really enjoyed this book. The way Mr. Rabinowitz intertwined his experiences in Myanamar with his own internal conflicts really personalized the story and captivated me as a reader. I also found his experiences with the Taron amazing - imagine seeing and interacting with the last of a group of humans before their extinction. One of the important ideas which I gained from this book is the idea that animals need to come first when a National Park is created. He showed what happens when the needs of the people living the area come first - extinction! At the same time he is careful to note that if the people living in the area are not given an alternative to their current way of life - no park will suceed. The world needs more Alan Rabinowitz's.

A good book
This was a good book, I think Jaguar was his best book but I liked this one. It must have been amazing to have trekked across such unknown wilderness and interact with the local villagers and see a part of the world that virtually no western eyes have seen. It must have been extremely difficult to deal with the reality of overexploitation of wildlife to trade for something as mundane as salt. Rabinowitz doesn't paint the local people as uncaring monsters. They are just trying to make a life for themselves and their families.

I would have like a few photographs of the animals, but this isn't a field guide. Overall the book was very good. I liked the way the Dr. Rabinowitz made the point that if any conservation effort is going to have even the smallest chance of being successful the local government and more importantly the local people need to be involved from day one.

great adventure
Massachusetts Sierran, March 2002
Diana Muir

Alan Rabinowitz has the best day job in America. The Bronx Zoo pays him to fly to parts of the world that have been off-limits to western scientists for generations. He assembles a team and walks into the forest where he treks beyond the point at which effective government ends, beyond the last road negotiable by Land Rover, beyond the last village. He comes back to report the existence of new species of large mammals previously unknown to science. Then he arranges to have vast tracks of wild land set off as protected nature reserves.
Rabinowitz works for the organization that runs the Bronx Zoo, the Wildlife Conservation Society, and he doesn't actually find an entirely new species of large mammal every time he steps into the bush. But the delicate Burmese leaf deer he discovered for science in 1997 is flourishing in forests that his Burmese scientific and administrative collaborators are working to conserve. Their efforts have resulted in the protection of 3.2% of the land area of Myanmar as national parkland or wildlife refuge. And the adventures in Myanmar recounted in Beyond the Last Village are merely the latest exploits in a career spent mapping the last refuges of the nearly extinct Sumatran rhino, tracking tigers in Thailand, and determining how large a jaguar preserve need be to succeed in preserving jaguar.
No one is perfect. Rabinowitz has a great story to tell, but he attempts to combine a sensitve exploration of his inner self with real-life adventures that play like an Indiana Jones movie. The outcome can be bad enough to make you wince. Here is Rabinowitz, the sensitive male, awaiting the birth of his child.
"The due date came and went, and I was surprised at how rattled I was. I had helped deliver a Mayan baby in the back of a pickup truck on a bumpy dirt road in southern Belize. I had sewn up my dog, Cleo, after his neck was ripped open by a jaguar. I had ridden for help on a motorcycle in Thailand with a broken leg and a bamboo stake through my foot. I had had to find my way out of the jungle with a subdural hematoma after a plane crash. But nothing compared to this. This was my child."
When Rabinowitz discovers a species unknown to science, he takes evidence to the Director of Genetics at the Bronx Zoo for expert confirmation. If he had taken the account of his trip to a professional writer for similarly expert help he would have a best seller on his hands. Make no mistake, Rabinowitz has a first-rate story to tell. The sort of story that might have reached millions of readers around the world and persuaded them of the importance of saving the world's last wild places. Instead we have a book that is almost wonderful.
This is a great read nevertheless because Rabinowitz is the real deal. He goes to places where we cannot go and sees things that we would never see. Had I somehow gotten permission to hike into upland forests of Myanmar off limits to outsiders, I would have seen some pretty little deer. Rabinowitz saw an undescribed species. And while the writing may be clunky, the adventure is real.
E. O. Wilson's new book, The Future of Life, is an elegant statement of the importance of preserving the biodiversity of this planet by protecting large, intact ecosystems from exploitation. Rabinowitz takes the problem down to cases.
His new species of leaf dear, along with bear, tiger, rhino and a bevy of southeast Asian species whose names I failed even to recognize, are endangered by poverty, and by a voracious Chinese appetite for bogus medicine and chimerical aphrodisiacs. Sometimes it can take surprisingly little to save them.
In the remote highlands of Myanmar Rabinowitz and his Burmese colleague, Dr. U Saw Tun Khaing, discovered villages with no access to salt. The only way that they could obtain this vital commodity was by hunting and selling wildlife parts to Chinese traders. Rhino, the species most prized by credulous Chinese men, were extirpated in the area decades ago.
Dr. Khaing has now set up a system in which payment in salt and other goods is made to villages that preserve the wildlife around them. Erstwhile hunters are employed as game monitors with the cost picked up by the Wildlife Conservation Society. Salt and self-interest will surely do more to induce local people to preserve game than any number of wardens could.
The pity is that poachers serving the Chinese market continue to hunt Asian rhino elsewhere. My son, the college student, suggests that the only way to protect the last wild Asian rhinos from poachers is to provide free Viagra to every middle-aged man in China. He just might be right. Meanwhile, I'm glad that Alan Rabinowitz is on the job.

Alan's third book and third best
Alan has a wonderful gift for expressing his expeditions and emotional journeys on paper. He can set you in the middle of his trails and make you feel his inner turmoils and exhilerations. Although Jaguar was by far his best book, this one should not be missed. I will be anxiouxly awaiting his next journey and book.

One Last Question
A wonderful book. Informative and cleanly written. Mr. Rabinowitz is a well informed, engaging storyteller who lays this story out with lots of quality information and a minimum of fuss. A book that's not particularly sentimental even in the sentimental parts.
But inquring minds, or this one at least, has one nagging question that this book might (and perhaps should) have been able to answer.
Mr. Rabinowitz freely admits he's got compulsion to travel and explore. Even though this compulsion takes a toll on his marriage Mr. Rabinowitz, for reasons he amply explains in the book, decides to trudge forward anyway.
The birth of his child is an epiphany, and is wonderfully described. <

The One Last Question is this: How will Mr. Rabinowitz reconcile the demands of fatherhood with his compulsion to travel?
... Read more

Book Description

The engaging writings gathered in this new book explore an important but little-publicized movement in American culture - the marked resurgence of agrarian practices and values in rural areas, suburbs, and even cities. It is a movement that in widely varied ways is attempting to strengthen society's roots in the land while bringing greater health to families, neighborhoods, and communities. The New Agrarianism vividly displays the movement's breadth and vigor, with selections by such award-winning writers as Wendell Berry, William Kittredge, Stephanie Mills, David Orr, Scott Russell Sanders, and Donald Worster.

As editor Eric Freyfogle observes in his stimulating and original introduction, agrarianism is properly conceived in broad terms, as reaching beyond food production to include a wide constellation of ideals, loyalties, sentiments, and hopes. It is a temperament and a moral orientation, he explains, as well as a suite of diverse economic practices - all based on the insistent truth that people everywhere are part of the land community, as dependent as other life on its fertility and just as shaped by its mysteries and possibilities.

The writings included here have been chosen for their engaging narratives as well as their depiction of the New Agrarianism's broad scope. Many of the selections illustrate agrarian practitioners in action - restoring prairies, promoting community forests and farms, reducing resource consumption, reshaping the built environment. Other selections offer pointed critiques of contemporary American culture and its market-driven, resource-depleting competitiveness. Together, they reveal what Freyfogle identifies as the heart and soul of the New Agrarianism: its yearning to regain society's connections to the land and its quest to help craft a more land-based and enduring set of shared values.

The New Agrarianism offers a compelling vision of this hopeful new way of living. It is an essential book for social critics, community activists, organic gardeners, conservationists, and all those seeking to forge sustaining ties with the entire community of life. ... Read more

Book Description

Participation in Quality Deer Management (QDM) is quickly spreading across the United States. This full-color book thoroughly explores the tenets of QDM, including land development, proper animal harvest, obtaining good doe-to-buck ratios, developing nutritious food sources, and many more principles that lead to healthier deer herds and bigger bucks with larger antlers.

The history and benefits of QDM are thoroughly explained, so landowners can determine if QDM is a feasible option. Landowners will learn how to test soil acidity, manage woodlands, create food plots, and estimate deer populations. Forestry management is reviewed, as well as proper QDM hunting strategies, and how to promote QDM to neighboring landowners.

Charles Alsheimer is an outdoor writer, lecturer, whitetail consultant, and award-winning nature photographer specializing in white-tailed deer.

• Describes quality deer management (QDM) as a tool for building quality deer herds

• Provides land and forestry management tips

• Discusses proper QDM hunting strategies for controlling antlerless herds ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Alsheimer Does it Again
Charlie Alsheimer is possibly the best white-tailed deer writer of all time. He is certainly the best deer photographer. His new book Quality Deer Managment the Basics and Beyond, is a prime example of both his talent as a writer and his brilliance as a photographer. I believe it to be his best book ever.
The book is written in Charlie's classic down home, easy to read style with easy to grasp explinations of complicated deer managment issues. He covers virtually every aspect of the QDM scene with common sense and uncommon insight. His treatment of the topic is inspirational and leaves you wanting to get out there and start practicing QDM now!
The photos chosen to illustrate the text are nothing short of spectacular. They bring the entire text to life in brilliant color and give you an up close and personal view of whitetails as only Alsheimer can.
After reading this book I picked up a copy of "Grow 'em Right" the new "how to" habitat and food plot book by Dougherty & Dougherty and am now ready to conquer the world of Quality deer managment. Now white-tailed deer book library is complete without this book ... Read more

Book Description

Environmental conflict resolution (ECR) is a process of negotiation that allows stakeholders in a dispute to reach a mutually satisfactory agreement on their own terms. The tools of ECR, such as facilitation, mediation, and conflict assessment, suggest that it fits well with other ideas for reforming environmental policy. First used in 1974, ECR has been an official part of policymaking since the mid 1990s. The Promise and Performance of Environmental Conflict Resolution is the first book to systematically evaluate the results of these efforts.

The Promise and Performance of Environmental Conflict Resolution presents empirical research along with insights from some of ECR’s most experienced practitioners. Beginning with a primer about concepts and methods, the book describes the kinds of disputes where ECR has been applied, making it clear that "despite the faith of proponents in the power and usefulness of ECR, it is not applicable to all environmental conflicts." The contributions that follow critically investigate the record and potential of ECR, drawing on perspectives from political science, public administration, regional planning, philosophy, psychology, anthropology, and law.

ECR is being extended to almost every area of environmental policy. Rosemary O'Leary and Lisa Bingham argue that truly effective use of ECR requires something more than advocacy. The Promise and Performance of Environmental Conflict Resolution provides scholars, policymakers, students, and practitioners with critical assessments, so that ECR can be used to its best advantage. ... Read more

Amazon.com

What have we learned since 1951, when Rachel Carson's charming The Sea Around Us was published, winning so many hearts and the National Book Award? The sea below us, as pioneering marine biologist Sylvia Earle and others have demonstrated, churns with far more life than Carson ever dreamed. Sea Change is an enthusiastic celebration of that diversity and abundance. It's also a profoundly sobering account of the shortsighted human assault on ocean life. The "silent tide," as one reviewer wrote, may lie just offshore. Only a sea change in human habits and economies will save the oceans.

Like Carson, Earle carved a place for herself in the public imagination despite resistance from those in her male-dominated field. Her tales of underwater adventure--including many record-breaking dives among the 6,000 hours she has spent underwater--are punctuated by stories about her increasing prominence as an advocate for the oceans. She's seen it all, it seems: a year diving with whales in Hawaii, visits to Prince William Sound and the Persian Gulf in the aftermath of colossal oil spills, etc. Her breezy prose won't win her the National Book Award, but few others wear Rachel Carson's mantle as gracefully. That is reason enough to read Sea Change. --Pete Holloran ... Read more

Reviews (8)

The history and science of oceanography
Much of this book is written in the first person, which in places makes it very appealing, but in other places is distracting. My other gripe is that she jumps around a bit in her life time - so one chapter she talks about being the only woman on an expedition, and then she is the 1990's leader of NOAA and then we are back to her childhood haunts and back again.

That being said, it is a good read, full of facts and history. She worked in the sciences back when women were uncommon in the field. Back when there was no scuba gear and Jacques Cousteau was in to spear fishing, not conservation. Interesting stories, indeed! So, if you want an account of oceanography, past and present, its extreme limits and cool equipment from a personal point of view, pick this one up.

A message of The Oceans
This book was full of information and facts that I didnt know and found interesting as well as a list of Marine Sanctuaries etc. Sylvia Earle has paved the way for many I really found some of her passages to be inspiring. I will now think everytime I eat shrimp! I would suggest this book to anyone interested in Marine Biology or the Ocean and its conservation.

Excellent story about the Oceans and the environment
Sylvia really opened my eyes to the fragile nature of our environment and to the beauty and vastness of the oceans. I highly recommend this book for anyone with the slightest interest in our environment and nature. This book will make you interested in learning and doing more for the environment.

Learn from one of the best
Sea Change is a marine science book written by a master marine scientists. There are very few people around these days who seem to be in full command (or nearly so) of their subject. Sylvia Earle appears to be one of these rare specimens. I think that young scientists also can learn quite a bit through the experiences and personal insights of great scholars like Dr. Earle, insights that usually are not shared with all students, insights, that are normally learned by often painfull experience. Sea Change shows us the development of a science, of an important part of our world, our society and it shows us the personal development of a fascinating woman. If you want to know scientific details about marine science, go and buy a textbook. If you want to know how one of the greatest marine scientists thinks, buy Sea Change.

Excellent overview of marine science, too autobiographical.
This book provides an interesting overview of the development of oceanographic and marine biological sciences. It does a fine job of detailing the envirobnmental issues effecting the ocean in a pretty objective maner. The book focusses too much on the author's (sometimes unrelated) experience, however. I wasn't looking for an autobiography, I wanted to understand the subject matter better. Some background about the author is useful, but it's overdone here in my opinion. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Much contemporary environmental literature names as enemies of the wildcorporate agriculture, logging, mining, and ranching. For mountain guide/philosopherJack Turner, these will not do. He dislikes even more the abstractions that divorce usfrom the natural world, which cause us to create pseudo-wild locales like YellowstoneNational Park and Grand Canyon, places that resemble nothing so much as Disneyland.Wilderness advocates who do not make themselves at home in the wild, he believes,cannot hope to understand the object of their desires, for only from that"complete immersion in place over time" can there arise the"wisdom that cannot emerge from tourism in a relic wilderness." Thissometimes blistering, provocative book is an eco-radical manifesto of a kind, and everyreader concerned with wilderness issues should pay attention to it. ... Read more

Reviews (12)

Read this book! It gets to the roots of conservation.
"From the summits of the Tetons, I see to the west a mosaic of farms scaring the round hills and valleys, as though someone had taken a razor to the face of a beautiful woman."

In THE ABSTRACT WILD, Turner gets to the heart of what it means to be wild, a concept that is often thrown around, but rarely defined. It has been overstepped again and again because nobody really thought that the concept of being wild was important. But as Tuner shows us in THE ABSTRACT WILD, it is the heart of being natural.

Turner found something out there in the wilderness that our society has lost. He had an intense personal experience that opened his eyes to the aura of the environment around him, to the sacred, to the holy, to what it meant to be wild. He found a critical link in our conservation ethic that has been "overstepped" because nobody knew to look there. Once we start to see the importance of the wilderness being self-ordered, autonomous, and wild. We will start to understand what needs to be done to effectively start protecting our natural environment. "As Stephen Jay Gould wrote, 'We cannot win this battle to save species and environments without forging an emotional bond between ourselves and nature as well-for we will not fight to save what we do not love'"

Deep ecology
The modern paradigms of economics, science, philosophy, social science, and conservation strategies are here critically scrutinized. Turner takes no prisoners, assailing even those institutions and organizations that are near and dear to many environmentalists. Of course, some of his points might be argued against, but this reader finds himself to be most often in agreement with the author. The outdoor "fun hog" whose views of nature are those of Outside magazine (and of a great number of commercial interests which encourage the consumption of nature as a means of self-pleasuring), will find no comfort here. At the very least this book is serious food-for-thought for anyone who loves and attempts to understand the wild.
Turner's description of proximity to a mountain lion in the Tetons, and of his "unreasonable terror" at the thought of being the hunted, struck a common cord with this reader, although in my experience the terror was rather more reasonable. The sense of exhilaration which followed can hardly be articulated and perhaps exceeded that described by Turner (but I digress...).
Says Turner: "... go into a great forest at night alone. Sit quietly for a while. ... smell and hearing and touch reassert themselves. The wild is keenly sensual. ... The majority of Americans no longer know this experience of the wild. We are surrounded by national parks, wilderness areas, wildlife preserves ...We are deluged with commercial images of wildness. There are nature movies ... nature books ... yuppie outdoor magazines ... philosophical magazines, scientific magazines ... Zoos and animal parks and marine lands abound ... From this we conclude that modern man's knowledge and experience of wild nature is extensive. But it is not. Rather, what we have is extensive experience of a severely diminished wilderness ... a caricature."

This kind of writing is rare
I got this book when searching for something for my biodiversity class to read that would hook them to the subject and move them the way "Sand County Almanac" did me back in my college days. Wasn't able to read it at the time, but I picked it up this fall, thought I would read an essay at a time before bed, like I usually do with essay books. Sometime in the wee hours I realized that I had to stop reading or I would head out into the dark night and wander until I found the wilderness again. Few modern writers, or writers of any age, have so clearly and eloquently expressed what it means to love the wild, what we are about to loose, and truly why we are loosing it despite efforts to the contrary. Turner's solution is one I believe in, but rarely find seriously advocated, probably because it would work. Frankly, if you haven't gone wild, you may not "get" this book. If you want to really know what the wild is about though, read this book and if you like the sound of things, go seek it out. If you are wild, this will be one of the few books on the topic you can stand to read these days. I haven't been so enlightened since I read "The Practice of the Wild" by Gary Snyder. Five stars means a great book. Some books are beyond that, this is one for the ages.

"Can we put the wild back in wilderness?"
This is a book about wildness. Not about the wilderness where it exists. More importantly this book is about you and me and how we think about wilderness.

I have single-handed my sailboat to Catalina Island many times and watched the dolphins with fascination as they played at the bow of my boat. You cannot help feeling a sense of connection with them as you watch them only a few feet away as they share their ocean with you.

As a young man I stood on top of Mt Whitney and looked out across the many mountain ranges of the High Sierras.

I purchased this book at the visitor's center while camping in Anza Borrego State Park in California. What an appropriate place to buy this book!

I have visited many National and State Parks and National Monuments crowded with people.

So, I have experienced the wildness that Jack Turner talks about and I have also visited the controlled spaces of our current managed wilderness areas that this book addresses.

Because the author has traveled in wilderness areas worldwide and a former philosophy professor from Cornel University and a long time climbing guide in the Tetons of Wyoming this book is an absolute jewel - well researched, eloquently written and straight from the heart.

What can I now write to get you to read this wonderful book? It is more than his opinion. It is a way of thinking about the world we live in and the true meaning of wilderness.

I sometimes end a review with some original poetry. Unfortunately, I am still trying to get my mind around this book. It is such great food for thought.

Here is a quote from the book:

"Do you want to change the world?
I don't think it can be changed.

The world is sacred.
It can't be improved.
If you tamper with it, you will ruin it.
If you treat like an object, you will lose it.
.....
The Master sees things as they are,
With out trying to control them.
He let's them go their own way,
and resides at the center of the circle."

Lao Tzu

Yes, this reads like a Zen koan. Don't meditate on it too long -read this book and then keep it in your backpack or sea bag.

A book with clarity and guts.
This book is such a welcome deviation from so much "environmental" judgmentalism, finger-pointing, and theoretical whining. Its basic premise is: how can we relate to the "wilderness" we wish to preserve when we don't even spend time with it? And: what, in fact, are we working to preserve?

There is a rawness and intensity to how the writer expresses himself that has a marvelous feeling of sincerity about it. He is not afraid to point up the shadow side of the very ecological programs he subscribes to. Reading, I had the feeling of sitting next to him by a campfire somewhere, or in front of the fireplace in his home in the Grand Teton, hearing him talk from the heart about things that concern him deeply. ... Read more

Book Description

The striped bass sustained American colonists through the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and went west with nineteenth-century pioneers. During the past one hundred years, however, Atlantic coastal stocks have been over-fished three times to the brink of recreational extinction. Today, the stripers are back in such numbers they're the center of a saltwater fly-fishing revival. George Reiger recounts his own relationship to the striped bass and traces the history of the great sportfish through such angling writers as Henry William Herbert and Robert Barnwell Roosevelt in the nineteenth century to Joe Brooks and Lefty Kreh in more recent decades. The book also demonstrates that the striper is heading for another collapse unless prevailing fisheries turn to better conservation policies. The Striped Bass Chronicles is a paean to a remarkable fish - and a prayer for its future. (61/4 X 91/4, 212 pages, illustrations) ... Read more

Reviews (1)

An addictive book about a noble fish
I found this book by chance, and as soon as I started reading it I couldn't put it down. By the time I was finished, I agreed that maybe the STRIPED BASS should be our national symbol, not the bald eagle. It's a fascinating fish, and an unknown player in American history and politics. It's also HUGE. Who knew that 150 pound monsters lurked in the East River? Reiger is a great writer, period. And he makes a compelling case for the gentlemanly art of catch and release fishing. ... Read more

Book Description

In the years since Chris Chester and his wife Rebecca rescued "B," a featherless baby sparrow--a creature with all the initial appeal of "a testicle with a beak"--they’ve had plenty of time to consider and reconsider their eccentric lifestyle. Along the way they’ve learned a great deal about the natural history of birds, and even more about that aligned avian species, the House Sparrow. And with this knowledge has come gratitude. For it is through B that Chester has discovered a renewed capacity for joy and wonder and an expanded realization of the consciousness and intelligence in living things. A book filled with acerb wit, frequent references to literature both high and low, and genuine reverence for the life around him, Providence of a Sparrow is Chris Chester’s beautiful meditation on life with B. ... Read more

Reviews (6)

"Providence" Satisfies on So Many Levels!
Don't be deceived by the title. This would be a gem of a book even if it WERE only about the author's life-altering relationship with a house sparrow. Fortunately, "Providence" is so much more, and ultimately so much more satisfying, as it roams with humor, poetry, candor and intelligence over many aspects of the author's life--his marriage, childhood memories, his struggle with depression, the death of his father, his philosophy about life and the afterlife, and so on. I alternately laughed out loud, cried, and nodded knowingly--sometimes within the space of a single page; I read passages aloud to my wife, who found it equally hilarious, poignant and profound. Chester's word choices are often unexpected--exquisitely so--and the cadence of his prose is captivating. "Providence" is, simply put, one of the best books I've ever had the pleasure of reading.

Unforgettable!
I thank this author for sharing the intimate details of his life. Thank you for allowing me to know "B." I savored every word of this heartwarming story. It was beautifully woven, provocative, intense, human.

Best Book Ever About a Pet Bird!
"Providence of a Sparrow" is simply the best book about a pet bird that I have ever read, and that means it even surpasses such charmers as "That Quail Robert" and "Arnie the Darling Starling." Chris Chester's close observations of a House Sparrow named B are equal parts wry, scientifically informed, and touching. I thought my wife Linda and I spoiled our birds, but Chris and his wife Rebecca go the extra mile for their feathered foundlings, and then several more miles on top of that. Chris weaves stories throughout his narrative about his father, Rebecca's belly dancing job, faithful cat Marlowe, and a host of other birds. But B demands and gets center stage in this truly amazing book that every animal lover should own.

A Phenomenal Book
Funny, tender, lyric, insightful and informative, "Providence of a Sparrow - Lessons from a Life Gone to the Birds" is, in my opinion, the best book ever written about an animal (in this case, a bird) and its relationship with a human being. Chester's prose is beautifully constructed and endlessly quotable. His description of canned cat food as "fish rectums packed in some sort of urine," is an amusing example. On his beloved House Sparrow's reaction to an exploding firecracker (the bird is napping at the time in Chester's hand): " . . . his neurons ignite for an instant, light up pathways unsealed from sleep; sentry calls to sentry with the message, 'You're safe in the hand that has never harmed you.' " The book is a universe.

I'll Never Use the Word "Birdbrain" Again!
What a terrific book - beautifully written and nuanced and utterly astounding. Who would ever have thought that a baby sparrow could become such an engaging and - dare I use it - intelligent companion. This is a must read for anyone with an interest the avian world. That "God knows every little sparrow," is made real in this book. Chester's memoir about the bird who changed his life is simply exquisite. Five stars. ... Read more

Book Description

Reviews (4)

beautiful writing, scary images, life
Blues for Cannibals can be a hard book at times to work through. The ideas become circular and repetitive but the beautiful writing often smooths over these rough spots, while at other times there is true beauty, touched with both horror and sadness, in its words and thoughts. Charles Bowden writes near the beginning that if he had life to live over again he "would never think that wars are events recorded in the book of history but realize they are actual and always take my hands from my ears and hear the cries of the slain." Much of this book is filled with those cries, and not only from war. He also would never say no to a woman or skip a meal. From evidence in this book, one gets the feeling he never has. The section on food and his dying friends is the best part of the book and reverberates with a quiet power. An unique book.

Dirt, water, sex, and food.
Charles Bowden places himself as a steel wedge into the crevices, what we've created of ourselves and our environment, the unsavory places, the mirror that we all shield our faces from, the places that we are all afraid to venture. He drives himself into these places because he knows that he ... we ... have become fearful hypocrites.

Once set, he kicks violently at the business end of that wedge with his feet to drive himself in further, going as far as a man can go without letting go: dirt, water, sex, and food, with a little booze and drugs thrown in to soften the edge of our brutal contemporary reality.

But now that he's found the courage to go to these places in our stead and make it back, he found it necessary to write about it and we find it necessary to read it. We know that we will likely never visit these places. We will only read vicariously and reflect nervously, remaining sadly and ultimately, fearful hypocrites to the end.

Bowden's Mesquite Manifesto.
Charles Bowden's got the blues. "I am a fallen man and I know it," he writes, "and I accept the torture of living this fact. But I will be damned--and they say I surely will be damned--if I accept God's answer. So I do not pray. Nor do I worship. I can love, I can comfort. I am the tree struggling in the hot ground of my desert. No bended knee and please no messages from on high. The messages must come from here, from the ground itself or away with them. That is what I learn from the mesguite, my brother-in-arms" (p. 6). In his 293-page book of revelations, he looks deeply into our cold, modern culture of gated communities, suicide, death row inmates, and sexual predators, to discover we are cannibals now--"we can devour and take but cannot give" (p. 28)--living a life of unrestrained consumption without future.

For too many of us, Bowden may be the best writer we've never read. His prose is powerful, prophetic, hallucinogenic, and poetic. Using mesquite as a metaphor to connect his essays, he encourages us to face the truth about American culture, and to question the people who try to give us easy answers. "I believe in dirt and bone and flowers and fresh pasta and salsa cruda and red wine," he writes. "I do not believe in white wine, I insist on color. I think death is a word and life is a fact, just as food is a fact and cactus is a fact" (p. 246). Although Bowden's "Mesquite Manifesto" is rooted in despair, in the end it encourages us to celebrate life: eat, lust, caress, fight, and swallow. "Now," Bowden tells us, "choke it down" (p. 277).

G. Merritt

"I am not a man of the center. I am from somewhere else."
Bowden's prose is actually a long tone poem, and if you read it this way, you will not be disappointed. The mesquite is the metaphor: once you read it, you'll understand, and you'll want to read more. Bowden is one of our most brutally honest writers practicing the trade today, but he writes with velvet gloves. He teaches us how to rejoice in our despair--he's a practicing buddhist, he just doesn't know it.
If you are new to Bowden's writing, this book is as good a place to start as any. For a man who has probably seen and witnessed the worst we can do to each other, he somehow holds out hope for the best. What else can we do but sink our taproots and satisfy our appetites?---at least that is something, as Bowden says... ... Read more

Book Description

If America has an Eden, it is Yosemite National Park, wheremillions of people crowd together every year to view virgin wilderness. IfAmerica has an Armageddon, it is the arid expanse of the Nevada Test Site, wherethe United States government has been rehearsing the end of the world since the1950seven though the land still legally belongs to the Shoshone Indians. Asexamined by Rebecca Solnit in this lyrical and brilliantly idiosyncratic book,these two places are war zones, and what is at stake is not only Western realestate but the American soul. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

A thrilling excursion into the heart of the West
If you have an open and inquisitive mind, no matter what your political outlook, you will enjoy this exploration of western America and our relationship with this unique landscape. Solnit weaves discussions about the settlement of the west by Euro-Americans, native American rights, nuclear testing, and other critical issues, with ruminations about H.D. Thoreau, John Muir, country music, landscape painters, and other intriguing topics. This is an excellent book about an important subject that will delight you if you let it.

Savage Dreams
This book is classic eco paganistic 1/2 truths and full tripe. Solnit carries on a dreamy and irresponsible massive 'feel good' opinion piece about the handfull of people harmed by our successfull development of our deffensive nuclear weapons. The author fails to note that our development and limited use of our weapons saved millions of lives.
If you are currently a eco pagan, here is more for your religion. If you want a full account of the history of our deffensive development of nuecs, don't waste your time reading this novel. However, if you want further insight into the basis that drives our planet's new pagan eco religion, then this book will help you to understanding their factualy fictionist journey into politics.

No romanticism here
Solnit's juxtaposition of the insidious nuclear poisoning of Nevada to the making of Yosemite National Park (that she shows has been "loved to death" since it was first discovered by whites more than 150 years ago)makes this book a must for all environmentalists. Solnit deals directly with themes of conquest and redemption in historic efforts to both tame and use these lands. Readers gain specific understanding about two places that are, after all, national icons. However, the deeper themes so well-developed in this book are being played out no less dramtically all across the country. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Modern American environmentalism owes much to such predecessors as Henry Thoreau, John Muir, and Theodore Roosevelt. But it owes much more, suggests historian Adam Rome, to the sprawling suburbs of the postwar era, when great sections of the country fell under the bulldozer to make way for the vaunted American Dream.

Homebuilders of the immediate postwar era did not, as a rule, take into account the environmental costs of their work--nor did they have to. "To take advantage of the cheap, unsewered land at the fringes of cities," writes Rome,

they could install septic tanks on tiny lots, in unsuitable soils, or near streams and wells. To reduce land-acquisition costs, builders also could level hills, fill wetlands, and build in floodplains. To maximize the number of lots in a tract, they could design subdivisions with no open space.

Rome's well-written book makes a welcome addition to the history of environmental thought, one to shelve alongside the best of Lewis Mumford and Jane Jacobs. --Gregory McNamee ... Read more

Book Description

In "Wildlife Wars," Terry Grosz serves up fascinating stories—alternately hair-raising, hilarious, and heart-wrenching—from his 30-year struggle to protect wildlife in America. A natural storyteller, Grosz writes about the remarkable characters he met—on both sides of the law—as he matched wits with elk poachers, salmon snaggers, commercial-market duck hunters, and a host of other law-breakers. Best of all, though, these stories are so remarkably entertaining you won’t want to put them down. ... Read more

Reviews (7)

Excellent!!!
Terry Grosz not only put himself in precarious and, often times, hilarious situations, he has a superb gift of storytelling. No other book has had me laughing so hard! Great gift!

A great pleasure to have read
This is the first of Terry Grotz's books that I've read but I'm hooked. Wonderful stories and insightful and interesting perspectives on the management of wildlife and our governments role. I look forward to reading "A Sword for Mother Nature".