Book Review – Hoopoe – A blog by nhbs

Book Review: New World Monkeys

Currently in our Backlist Bargains sale!

RRP £42.00, now just £25.20

***** Comprehensive and incredibly accessible

When I recently reviewed The Real Planet of the Apes, I casually wrote how that book dealt with the evolution of Old Work monkeys and apes, ignoring New World monkeys which went off on their own evolutionary experiment in South America. But that did leave me wondering. Those New World monkeys, what did they get up to then? Here, primatologist Alfred L. Rosenberger provides a comprehensive and incredibly accessible book that showed these monkeys to be far more fascinating than I imagined.

Most people are probably not very familiar with these monkeys. Technically known as platyrrhines, they are predominantly arboreal (i.e. living in trees), small to medium-sized primates. You might know the insanely loud howler monkeys from nature documentaries. Perhaps you have heard of capuchin monkeys or spider monkeys. But you could be forgiven for not having heard of marmosets and tamarins, or the even more obscurely named titis, sakis, and uacaris. A total of 16 genera are recognized, but outside of the scientific literature and technical books, these monkeys are not all that well known. And that is a shame as, from an evolutionary perspective, this is a unique group.

Marmoset, Sagui gritando by Joao Guillherm Soares Dias, via flickr.

Now, before Rosenberger gets to this, it helps to better know these monkeys. Accompanied by many excellent illustrations and photos, the first half of New World Monkeys is dedicated to their ecology, behaviour, and morphology. Topics covered include their diet and dentition; locomotion and the anatomy of hands, feet, and prehensile tails; but also brain size and shape; and their social organization and ways of communicating via sight, sound, and smell.

The platyrrhines are a diverse bunch with some remarkable specialisations. In the family Cebidae we find the smallest members, some of whom, the Marmosets and Pygmy Marmosets, have teeth specialized for gouging the bark of gum trees and feeding on the gum that is released in response. In the family Pitheciidae we find the only nocturnal member, the Owl Monkeys, which have concomitant morphological adaptations such as enlarged eyes. In both this and the closely related Titi Monkeys, individuals have the adorable habit of twining their tails when socializing or sleeping. The family Atelidae is home to species with exceptionally prehensile tails whose underside ends in a pad with a fingertip-like surface. The Muriquis and the aptly-named Spider Monkeys use them as a fifth limb in locomotion, as demonstrated by a striking photo of a Black-faced Spider Monkey on plate 13. Here we also find the well-known Howler Monkeys, whose skull is heavily modified to support the exceptionally loud vocal organs in their throat and neck.

Black Howler Monkey Portrait #1 by Ryan Poplin, via flickr.

Despite these differences, platyrrhines are closely related and form what is called an adaptive radiation. Just like the textbook example of Darwin’s finches, many members have evolved unique adaptations and ways of living to minimise competition and maximise resource partitioning. Two ideas feature prominently in this book to explain how platyrrhines have evolved and what makes this adaptive radiation both so diverse and so interesting.

One idea is what Rosenberger calls the Ecophylogenetics Hypothesis. If I have understood him correctly, this combines information on a species’ ecology and phylogeny, its evolutionary relationships. It can offer hypotheses on how ecological interactions have evolved, but it also recognizes that ecological adaptations are shaped and constrained by evolutionary relatedness. For the platyrrhines, taxonomically related members are also ecologically similar. To quote Rosenberger: “[…] phylogenetic relatedness literally breeds resemblance in form, ecology, and behavior” (p. 96) and “Each of the major taxonomic groups that we define phylogenetically is also an ecological unit […]” (p. 97).

The other idea that makes the platyrrhines so interesting is dubbed the Long-Lineage Hypothesis. An extensive chapter on the fossil record documents how the whole radiation has been remarkably stable for at least 20 million years. Today’s New World monkeys are virtually unchanged from their ancestors, living the same lifestyles and occupying the same ecological niches. Some fossils have even been classified in the same genus as their living counterparts. This stands in sharp contrast to the evolutionary history of Old World monkeys where there has been a constant churn, whole groups of primates evolving and going extinct with time.

Red-backed Bearded Saki (Chiropotes sagulatus) by Allan Hopkins, via flickr.

What stands out, especially when Rosenberger starts talking taxonomy and evolution, is how well written and accessible the material here is. He takes his time to enlighten you on the history, utility, and inner workings of zoological nomenclature, making the observation that “names can reflect evolutionary hypotheses”. Here, finally, I read clear explanations of terms such as incertae sedis (of uncertain taxonomic placement), monotypic genera (a genus consisting of only a single species), or neotypes (a replacement type specimen). Similarly, there are carefully wrapped lessons on how science is done – on the distinction between scenarios and hypotheses, or how parsimony and explanatory efficiency are important when formulating hypotheses. Without ever losing academic rigour or intellectual depth, Rosenberger quietly proves himself to be a natural-born teacher and storyteller, seamlessly blending in the occasional amusing anecdote.

A final two short chapters conclude the book. One draws on the very interesting question of biogeography, i.e. on how platyrrhine ancestors ended up in South America, which was long an island continent. Rosenberger convincingly argues against the popular notion of monkeys crossing the Atlantic on rafts of vegetation* and in favour of more gradual overland dispersal. The other chapter highlights their conservation plight as much of their tropical forest habitat has been destroyed by humans.

With New World Monkeys, Rosenberger draws on his 50+ years of professional experience to authoritatively synthesize a large body of literature. As such, this book is invaluable to primatologists and evolutionary biologists and should be the first port of call for anyone wanting to find out more about the origins, evolution, and behaviour of these South and Central American primates.

* One mechanism that Rosenberger does not mention is that tsunamis could be behind transoceanic rafting, as argued in a recent Science paper. This looked at marine species in particular and I doubt it would make much of a difference for terrestrial species. Most of the objections Rosenberger gives would still apply.

New World Monkeys is available from our bookstore here.

Book Review: Metamorphosis

***** A delightful potpourri

Entomologist Erica McAlister, the Curator of Diptera at the Natural History Museum, London (NHM), has previously written two popular science books on flies, The Secret Life of Flies and The Inside Out of Flies. Her mission is to change your mind not just about flies, but, as Metamorphosis shows, about insects in general. In her third book with the NHM, she teams up with radio producer Adrian Washbourne with whom she worked on the 10-part BBC Radio 4 series Metamorphosis: How Insects Are Changing Our World that formed the basis for this book. A delightful potpourri of entomology, Metamorphosis is particularly strong on the science history front and further solidifies McAlister’s reputation as a science communicator par excellence.

Metamorphosis is the same size as the preceding two books on flies, a small 14 × 20 cm hardback that is illustrated throughout. Its ten chapters, clocking in at 20 pages or fewer, each focus on one particular group of insects that stand out for one reason or another. She examines the biomechanical and biochemical details that allow fleas to jump so far. She explains how Darwin predicted (correctly) the existence of a hawkmoth species with an exceptionally long tongue by examining an equally exceptional orchid. Plus, there is an engrossing chapter on blowflies and their role in forensic entomology, a topic I find particularly fascinating.

Author Erica McAlister. Credit: Channel 5

The flap text explicitly mentions the book will consider modern applications of entomology. Indeed, each chapter concludes with a brief section on current and expected future applications. There is unsurprisingly a fair amount of robotics here, with fleas and bees inspiring different kinds of miniature robots. The question of how beetles harvest water from coastal fog in the otherwise bone-dry Namib desert has inspired research on new water-repellent surface materials. Other research on moth tongues is informing the development of micro- and nanostraws that could one day result in safely reusable medical needles. Meanwhile, several start-ups are optimising rearing protocols for black soldier flies that could become the future of animal protein in our food. This would help recycle organic waste and eliminate the environmental impacts of livestock farming. However, it will require finding ways to overcome our disgust of insects and our reluctance to try new food.

The applications, however, come across as a sideshow. Instead, Metamorphosis excels in telling utterly fascinating chapters from the history of entomology. Drosophila (which are not true fruit flies but called vinegar flies) are a widely used model system in biological research. The famous Fly Lab of geneticist and embryologist Thomas Hunt Morgan (1866–1945) pioneered their use. The remarkable part is that he was sceptical of both Darwin’s and Mendel’s ideas and hoped to disprove them, but ended up doing the exact opposite, finding evidence of classic Mendelian inheritance patterns in certain mutant flies. Or, take the story of the remarkable Victorian entomologist Margaret Fountaine (1862–1940), who used the inheritance of an uncle to travel the world solo, amassed an enormous butterfly collection now housed at Norwich Castle Museum, and left a time capsule of twelve notebooks with instructions not to open these until 1978. McAlister & Washbourne also provide an extended backstory to African American entomologist and civil rights activist Charles Henry Turner (1867–1923) who Lars Chittka also featured in The Mind of a Bee. Turner was denied an academic position on grounds of his ethnicity yet staunchly laboured on and made pioneering observations on bee behaviour in particular. He was ahead of his time in refusing to see bees ‘as simple reflex machines driven by spontaneous reactions to environmental stimuli’ (p. 185).

Hummingbird Hawkmoth feeding on a flower — Research on moth tongues is informing the development of micro- and nanostraws. Image by Peter Stenzel via Flickr.

These and other people are vividly brought to life here. The only fly in the ointment is some errors in dates: apothecary James Petiver apparently lived from 1865 to 1718 (he was born somewhere between 1663 and 1665 according to a published chronology), Turner supposedly married his wife in 1896 even though she died in 1895 (they married in 1886), and Turner himself died in 1923 and two pages later in 1958 (the former is correct). Other than reiterating the importance of proofreading numbers, this minor complaint does not diminish the fact that the history-of-science component of Metamorphosis is utterly engrossing. Many of these stories are largely unknown to the general public, with only articles in specialist journals commemorating the achievements of these historical figures. There are several biographies in here waiting to be written and McAlister & Washbourne have the makings of a fine pair of science biographers.

Whether you enjoyed the BBC Radio 4 series when it aired, find yourself in the museum’s gift shop wondering whether this book is worthwhile, or nurture an interest in entomology or the history of science (or the intersection of the two), I warmly recommend this little book, especially given the reasonable cover price.

Metamorphosis is available from the NHBS online store.

Book Review: Lost Wonders

***** An emotional gut punch of a book

When you think Sixth Extinction, animals and plants such as the St. Helena olive, the Bramble Cay melomys, or the Christmas Island forest skink are unlikely to come to mind. And therein lies a problem: behind the faceless statistics of loss lie numerous stories of unique evolutionary lineages that have been snuffed out. In this emotional gut punch of a book, author and journalist Tom Lathan takes the unconventional approach of examining ten species that have gone extinct since 2000, nine of which you will likely never have heard of. Lathan momentarily resurrects them to examine what led to their loss and speaks to the people who tried to save them.

The one species and individual you are likely to have heard of is Lonesome George, the last Pinta Island tortoise, who received much media attention both in life and in death. The remainder are barely known outside of the small circle of conservationists who studied them. Of the unfortunately long list Lathan obtained from the IUCN, he has chosen a nicely balanced mix of species. Each chapter opens with a tastefully executed pencil-and-ink drawing by Lathan’s partner Claire Kohda. The geographic spread similarly includes organisms from around the globe (though no maps have been included, which would have been helpful). What unites these species is that they all lived, literally or functionally, on islands (environments prone to evolutionary experimentation and extinction), and they are no longer with us.

Each of the ten chapters mixes several elements such that, despite most chapters being quite long at 30–40 pages, all are very engaging. Lathan introduces what we know about their biology and how the frequent paucity of information frustrated subsequent attempts at captive breeding. By telling the stories of their discovery and formal description, Lathan answers his question of whether naming a species “is itself a life-giving act” (p. 28): it allows us to formulate conservation plans, making naming “the difference between life and death” (p. 29). Of course, species exist before we describe them, and his overview of their evolution is a potent reminder of this. It also highlights how, given enough time, organisms can reach remote islands and establish themselves there, despite the odds not being in their favour.

All of the above is relevant background information, but we are here for the stories of what went wrong. In the introduction, Lathan emphasizes just how incomplete our knowledge is: there is both a long queue of species awaiting assessment by the underfunded IUCN and an even larger pool of “dark extinctions” (p. 4): species that vanish before we even know of their existence. These stories are “a snapshot of extinction […] each a stand-in for other[s] that we will probably never know occurred” (p. 4). There is that importance of taxonomy again.

If extinctions of Pleistocene megafauna can reasonably be attributed to a mixture of human hunting and climate change, the fingerprint of more recent Holocene extinctions is clearly human. Lathan points out that our species is “one of the most potent agents of ecological destruction, regardless of time, place, or culture” (p. 135). For instance, the arrival of native Polynesians to Hawai’i already triggered a wave of extinction, such that the arrival of Europeans “was more like a passing of the baton in an ecocidal relay race” (p. 136). That said, in his next breath he immediately recognizes that European colonialism cranked up extinction to eleven—it is a good example of Lathan’s balanced reporting. What follows is the usual litany of rapacious resource extraction that destroys natural habitats and the accidental or purposeful introduction of invasive species. The two often work in tandem.

The strongest suit of Lost Wonders is the nearly 50 interviews with scientists, conservationists, hobbyists, and others whose first-hand experiences and frustrations imbue this work with much pathos. There are stories of species slipping through our hands as their habitats vanished (e.g. the Bramble Cay melomys, a rat, or the Alagoas foliage-gleaner, a bird); of ignored warnings, bureaucratic red tape, and apprehensive committees delaying meaningful action (e.g. the Polynesian tree snail P. labrusca or the Christmas Island pipistrelle); and of captive breeding efforts failing (e.g. the Mexican Catarina pupfish). By asking how the people involved experienced witnessing extinction, each chapter delivers an emotional gut punch that, I will not lie, sometimes brought me to tears. Some people still struggle talking about it, even a decade or more later, breaking down during their interviews. Others describe feelings of grief, depression, and loneliness, unable to truly share with others what they experienced. Lathan himself in his epilogue expresses his astonishment at “their capacity to articulate the profundity of what they had witnessed” and wonders out loud: “When a million years of evolution is extinguished right in front of you, what words suffice to describe this moment?” (p. 351).

Taking a step back to compose myself I do, however, have two points of criticism; or, if not criticism, two points I feel have been omitted. First, there is the proximate question of whether trying to save a species at all costs is always the best use of the limited time, money, and other resources available for conservation. Not everybody agrees it is, and e.g. Inheritors of the Earth provocatively argued that island species are evolutionary dead ends, vulnerable to invasion. Are resources better spent on populations that still stand a decent chance? A counterargument could be made that, yes, these attempts *are* worthwhile because we learn how to improve our protocols, techniques, and technologies for the inevitable next extinction. My point is that Lathan does not broach these questions here. I would have loved for him to wrestle with these and put them to his interviewees. Second, there is the ultimate question of what it would take to turn the tide of extinction, of what such a world would look like. I judge him less harshly on this because very few authors seem willing to mention the root causes that got us here. His interviewees gave him several openings at broaching thorny topics that he did not pursue. This is another set of questions where both his views and those of his interviewees could have further enriched the book.

The above suggestions would have been cherries on the cake but, as it stands, the proverbial cake is both edible and rich. Lost Worlds is an incredibly moving book that tugs at the heartstrings and draws on an impressive number of interviews. These eyewitness stories are a powerful reminder that behind each reported extinction lies a tremendous amount of work, and the loss of a unique way of life on this planet.

Lost Wonders is available from our bookstore here.

Our Staff Favourites

Welcome to our annual round-up of the books and equipment we have enjoyed reading and using this year, all chosen by members of the NHBS team.

Close Encounters of the Fungal Kind

This book takes you on a mycological odyssey, exploring the vast fungal kingdom through beautiful prose, engaging anecdotes, and fascinating facts. I particularly liked how the chapters are broken up into mushroom-based ecological niches like rotters or parasites, making an overwhelming amount of information easily accessible. An ideal gift for the fungally-inclined people in your life.

– Tom, Technical Advisor

Ocean Bottle

I love the simple design and vibrant colours of this recyclable bottle! Although what really sets the Ocean Bottle apart is its commitment to cleaner oceans – each item sold funds the removal of 1,000 plastic bottles from the marine environment! I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to reduce their plastic consumption and help protect our planet.

– Jess, Equipment Purchasing Coordinator

Living on Earth

I was very excited to get my hands on the finale to this ambitious trilogy – and I was not disappointed! This book marks the conclusion to an exploration of intelligence on planet Earth and its origins. It touches on how life shapes, and has been shaped by, its environment and takes readers on an exploration through compelling accounts of intelligence in the natural world – an excellent read, and the perfect finish to this thought-provoking trilogy!

– Poppy, Ecology Content Editor

Viking Cygnus Monocular

If you are looking for a handy monocular then the Viking Cygnus is a great choice. It is easy to fit in my coat pocket so I tend to take it with me much more that I would a heavier pair of binoculars. It is also lightweight and easy to handle – my son had a great time with it in the woods!

– Adam, Marketing and Sales Manager

Wilding

Isabella Tree’s Wilding is a special blend of personal narrative and ecological exploration. Her vivid descriptions and terrific storytelling bring rewilding to life and paints a hopeful picture for the future of ecological recovery in Britain – it has left me with a renewed appreciation for the power of nature and its remarkable ability to heal itself. This illustrated children’s version makes a lovely gift.

– Jo, Marketing Assistant

Bird Photographer of the Year

As a wildlife photographer and cameraman, it’s always been a draw to me to look at the structure and composition of how others “see” their subject. Ansel Adams once said that it is the 12 inches behind the camera that is the most important part of an image making process. While the camera hardware is important, the photographer’s eye is more so. This book shows that that is the case, with amazing studies of birds, their lives, and the beauty of nature. This year’s book is truly inspiring.

– Simon, Books Purchasing Coordinator

Num’axes Bird Feeder

A step-up from the average bird feeder, this innovative product captures high-quality videos and photos of birds and other wildlife in action. It works well in all weather conditions and has been used to capture superb videos around my garden – a must have for any bird enthusiast!

– Mark, Product and Purchasing Manager

Under the Changing Skies

Under Changing Skies is a sweeping, lyrical and illuminating journey through the British countryside as written by some of the countries most celebrated nature writers. This collection of entries for the Guardian’s Country Diary will make a beautiful gift for nature lovers!

– Oli, Designer

Gift in a Tin Range

The Gift in a Tin range has everything you need to create your own wooden models, plus a cool fact sheet to learn more about the animals in the kit. They are a great way to spark children’s interest in nature, while having some creative fun at the same time, and are perfect for an affordable gift, or a treat for yourself!

– Dan, Technical Advisor

Bird Nester Gift Box

This gift box is a fantastic little package for any budding birdwatcher. The nest itself is beautifully designed and is made with recycled saris which adds a unique touch to every nest. Plus, the included bird food is a great way to support local wildlife, especially during the colder months – a great way to bring a bit of nature into your home.

– Elle, Marketing Coordinator

Nature’s Calendar

Inspired by the traditional Japanese calendar, this book takes the reader through 72 seasons in the British Isles. Each season is represented by different natural phenomenon, and the book features themes of folklore, tradition and natural history. It is a great way to learn more about how nature changes throughout the seasons and has allowed me to interact with the world around me in a unique way.

– Sam, Publishing Assistant

StarSense Explorer LT 70AZ Refractor Telescope

StarSense Explorer LT 70AX Refractor Telescope

This telescope is a great choice for budding astronomers! It’s the first telescope that uses a dedicated app to analyse the night sky, which identifies all the constellations and celestial objects visible to the user. It’s perfect for those who are just getting started with astronomy and would make a brilliant gift this Christmas!”

– Adam, Technical Advisor

Book Review: Radical by Nature

***** A tremendously enjoyable biography

2023 marked the 200th anniversary of the birth of Victorian naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace. Best remembered as the father of biogeography and co-discoverer of natural selection, he was an all-round fascinating person. Evolutionary biologist, entomologist, and Darwin and Wallace scholar James T. Costa gives an in-depth, intimate, and updated story of his life.

Given the many other available Wallace biographies, why read this one? Because Costa can safely be considered an expert on the history of evolutionary thought. Next to three books on Darwin since 2009, Costa has also studied Wallace’s life and work since 2010, resulting in three books, not to mention numerous academic papers and magazine articles. What this means in practical terms is that Costa provides context, context, context.

As such, he explains the relevance and novelty of Wallace’s ideas at the time (and I am going to be very selective here). For instance, Wallace was one of the first to insist on the recording of accurate location data when collecting animals and plants. When moving east and west in the Malay Archipelago, he thus noticed that the fauna on some neighbouring islands differed sharply, a local division later named the Wallace Line. It undermined geologist Charles Lyell’s idea that environment alone determines distribution.

Speaking of Lyell, some of Wallace’s most underrecognized ideas concern transmutation (as evolution was known back then). Lyell claimed that species were immutable entities and that the fossil record reflected separate rounds of creation. Wallace disagreed; he was never one to shy away from discussion, even with intellectual giants. His then-novel idea was that “every species arises in immediate proximity to a preexisting and closely related species” (p. 158). But how? Wallace’s flash of insight on natural selection, the remarkable confluence of Darwin and Wallace’s ideas, and the case Wallace was building against Lyell are all deeply interesting topics that I am deferring to other reviews. Instead, let me briefly consider his take on anthropology. Wallace was fascinated with the indigenous people he encountered and his approach “was nothing less than a natural history of humans” (p. 196), applying the same evolutionary logic he applied to other animals. Against the background of a divided discipline back in London between polygenists (who saw races as separate entities, even species) and monogenists (who saw “races” as variations of a single human species), Wallace hewed closer to the latter.

Costa also provides much historical context on Wallace the person. He is rightly remembered as a humanitarian scholar for whom justice was his lodestar. Utopian socialist Robert Owen left a deep impression and the young Wallace was a regular at the halls of science and mechanics’ institutes that were just then popping up everywhere. These promoted self-improvement of working-class people through education. His full conversion to socialism came much later in life though. Wallace was an early advocate of women’s rights, supported the suffragette movement, and more than once campaigned for scholarly societies to allow women in. He also campaigned for land reform, and in hindsight regretted that many of his early survey jobs served ongoing efforts at land enclosure that effectively screwed the poor.

Cyriopalus wallacei Pascoe, 1866 (Cerambycidae: Cerambycinae) Holotype. — Cyriopalus wallacei Pascoe, 1866 (Cerambycidae: Cerambycinae) collected by Alfred Russel Wallace, via flickr.

Now, how for some context to the above context? Despite the above character sketch, it would be an oversimplification to celebrate Wallace as “an almost uniquely nonracist, egalitarian Victorian […] who was “woke”” (p. 166) before the rest of us were. Sure, he was respectful towards indigenous people, credited his field assistants, and criticized European civilization. But for all that, he was a product of Britain’s global empire. Wherever he went, he could call on officials, transportation networks, and crews of unnamed porters and boatsmen for assistance. And despite his opposition to slavery, he frequently turned a blind eye to slave-holding friends and expats.

Further commenting on Wallace’s character (here comes more context), Costa admits that Wallace’s trusting nature could border on the gullible. His interest in spiritualism caused disbelief among his peers, even while they praised his scientific achievements. Costa points out that many science historians forget how it impregnated Victorian society at all levels and even some of his critics attended séances suspiciously often. The other faux pas is Wallace’s opposition to smallpox vaccination campaigns. Wallace, himself vaccinated, was all about the science, but this was in its infancy in the 19th century. “We cannot hold those who lived in the past to standards based on modern understanding” (p. 353), pleads Costa. Fortunately, we find him on the right side of history where eugenics is concerned, which he denounced as “the meddlesome interference of an arrogant, scientific priestcraft” (p. 490, note 52).

Costa’s writing is lively, occasionally interjected with chatty remarks or witticism that made me chuckle. When Wallace writes that Alexander von Humboldt’s travel narrative gave him a desire to visit the tropics, Costa responds that “Wallace got a “desire to visit the tropics” all right” (p. 46). When Wallace scathingly remarks that indigenous women in New Guinea are “the least engaging specimens of the fair sex” he had ever met, Costa parries that “chances are he was not viewed by the locals as the hottest specimen of white European manhood either” (p. 231). And when only the religious Lyell is willing to take serious Wallace’s new spiritualist tendencies, Costa imagines how “Darwin could only shake his head at the two of them” (p. 310). I found these a welcome source of levity.

Beetles collected in the Malay Archipelago by Alfred Russel Wallace. — Beetles collected in the Malay Archipelago by Alfred Russel Wallace, via flickr.

Much more can be said about both Wallace and this wonderful biography. Wallace left behind a mountain of written material for historians. Instead, let me circle back to my first question. Why read this biography? In fairness, other biographies provide details omitted here. Far more important, however, is what Costa adds. Much unpublished information has come to light since the 2013 centenary and Costa has drawn extensively on the archive of material that Wallace’s grandsons had. This was gradually annotated and digitised from 2010 onwards as part of the publicly accessible Wallace Correspondence Project and has allowed Costa to add much intimate detail from hundreds of personal letters.

Given the above, Costa’s stated aim of writing an updated biography has been more than realised; this book is a triumph! I tremendously enjoyed Radical by Nature and was very impressed with the depth of its scholarship. Next to an intimate portrait of this most fascinating scholar, Costa provides much detail on a critical period of scientific development and the social context in which it unfolded.

Radical by Nature is available from the NHBS bookstore here.

Fungi Under the Lens and Fork: An NHBS Booklist

Parasol Mushroom by S. Rae via flickr. — Parasol Mushroom by S. Rae, via flickr.

In the early stages of the average mushroom-enthusiast’s journey, there comes a time where you begin to consider where you can take the interest of fungi further. Maybe you have identified all the mushrooms in your garden and want to learn more, or maybe you’ve even been intrepid, foraging and sampling some of the edible species out there, and are left wanting more. What ‘more’ looks like to some people becomes growing your own mushrooms, making spore prints, creating your own ink from the dripping tops of an inkcap mushroom, or perhaps you may want to look down a microscope to explore the sub-perceptual world of fungal microscopy, and that’s what these books aim to facilitate.

However you choose to flesh out your interest, the books below provide an excellent guide to the next steps in mycology.

Radical Mycology: A Treatise on Seeing and Working with Fungi

Radical Mycology is an awesome book in a very biblical sense. it inspires awe and in a more modern sense it is simply really, really cool. This book is a single man’s knowledge of all things fungi, distilled into 646 pages of rich prose, instruction and guidance. It moves through topics, that many other books have tackled in single volumes alone, in sections such as ethnomycology, culture, cultivation, medicine (*see footnote) and lab work, and does so in a way that doesn’t feel clunky or dense. I don’t think there is a topic in mycology that isn’t covered by this book in some way, and that to me makes it a unique treasure trove of knowledge. A field guide it is not, being quite large and very heavy, and it is not trying to pretend to be anything other than a treatise on the world of mycology. Filled with activities and projects that you can do yourself, it is not a passive book. It gets you interacting with and manipulating fungi, working with them in a way that you would not otherwise, and for that I think it is highly recommended for every reader, from the beginner to the professional. And if none of that takes your fancy, there is even a section on mushroom–related puns and a printout–and–play boardgame!

Growing Mushrooms at Home: The Complete Guide to Knowing, Growing and Loving Fungi

A more focussed look at cultivation and less dense than Radical Mycology, this book is primarily aimed at beginners who are looking to expand their knowledge of cultivation in its many forms, and is filled with simple, easy to follow text and beautiful images of mushrooms. It is designed to be accessible, so I would wager that this title is not suited for those of you with more experience in the field. But, for a first foray into mushroom cultivation this might be the book for you.

Organic Mushroom Farming and Mycoremediation: Simple to Advanced and Experimental Techniques for Indoor and Outdoor Cultivation

Organic Mushroom Farming and Mycoremediation takes a deeper dive into the same topic as the previous title. The book spans from easy projects that you can do at home with very little resources, to more advanced techniques that even the most experienced mycologist would enjoy having under their belt. The book also touches on mycoremediation (using mushrooms to improve the environment, from pollutants etc.), which is a wholly worthy topic on its own and will open your eyes to the potential for individuals to change the world for the better. After all, anyone who’s anyone in mycology has tried growing mushrooms on their old clothes, right?

Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms: A Companion Guide to the Mushroom Cultivator

No list of mushroom cultivation books would be complete without a title by Paul Stamets – and this one is no exception. A dated publication now, owing to its original publishing in 1988 and subsequent re-prints in 1994 and 2000, have meant this this book has taken a back seat to the new shiny covers in the field. However, this has not dulled its brilliance at all, and it remains one of the most influential books on mushroom cultivation. The book contains foundational knowledge on mushroom cultivation for the amateur grower and is still held in high regard by anyone with a slight interest in modern mushroom cultivation. A must read and a true introduction to mastering the art of mushroom cultivation.ng mycologist.

* ‘Mushroom medicine’ is a term used often in fungal–oriented literature, and sometimes quite liberally. I would be remiss to note that processes, procedures and purported effects are anecdotal and not always backed up by peer–reviewed empirical research, and in a lot of cases research is ongoing. This is not to say it is not true, it’s to say that more research is usually needed. Be aware of the legality of foraging mushrooms in your area and remember, don’t munch on a hunch! Always ID your mushrooms and if you are not 100% confident consult a professional.

Book Review: Eight Bears

***** A mighty fine environmental reportage

Though bears loom large in our collective imagination, their flesh-and-blood counterparts are increasingly losing ground. Eight Bears, the debut of environmental journalist Gloria Dickie, draws on visits to key hotspots where Earth’s remaining bear species come into conflict with humans. By interviewing scores of people, both conservationists and those suffering at the paws of these large predators, this nuanced and thought-provoking reportage asks whether humans and bears can coexist.

The roots of this book go back to 2013 when Dickie started a master’s in environmental journalism and midway settled on bear-human conflicts in the Rocky Mountains. Since then, she has travelled to Asia and the Americas to see first-hand all eight extant bear species. The only obvious regions missing from her story are Alaska, Russia, and Europe, all of which have large populations of bears. Even so, she has visited a formidable list of destinations. As an aside here, kudos to both the stylish bear portraits by Arjun Parikh opening each chapter, and Dickie’s meticulous list of notes. The latter mentions the many people she has interviewed or corresponded with over the years and, for some sources, provides additional notes that are too detailed for the main narrative.

The first half of the book’s subtitle promises a look at the bear’s mythic past. Though there is mention here of the predominance of bears in northern hemisphere cultures, the so-called circumpolar bear cult tradition, and the rarely discussed role of the bear in Peruvian culture and history, this is a minor motif in the book. Much more can be and has been said about the cultural history of bears.

Three wild bears, one brown adult and two white cubs, sat by a streams edge, — Wild animals by bm.iphone via flickr.

Instead, as seems unavoidable when writing about megafauna nowadays, the focus of Eight Bears is on the second half of the subtitle, their imperilled future. The outlook is grim and Dickie early on mentions that “almost everywhere I went, bears seemed to be a shadow of what they once were” (p. 8). Probably the biggest threat is habitat loss, followed closely by hunting and poaching. A historic combination of these two decimated North American bear populations under European settlement. Polar bears have become the poster children of climate change, though the disappearance of sea ice is yet another form of habitat loss. I would be remiss if I did not mention that several whistleblowers have argued that hunting poses a continued but underappreciated threat to polar bears. Asia is additionally home to some particularly grisly practices: sloth bears are beaten into submission to become dancing bears, and moon and sun bears are experiencing years of, what is effectively, surgical torture on bile farms. The former has been outlawed with a reasonable degree of success, the latter less so. From her descriptions, Dickie visits the same bile farmer and speaks to some of the same people that Nuwer interviewed for her 2018 book Poached. Little seems to have improved in the intervening years, unfortunately.

Though bears are usually at the losing end of human-wildlife conflict, Dickie does not avoid exploring the flipside. Many readers outside of Asia might be surprised to learn that the inappropriately named sloth bear is easily the world’s most dangerous bear. In India, more than 100 attacks every year kill or gruesomely injure predominantly poor, rural people, with Dickie seeking out some of the victims. In the USA, where grizzly populations are recovering, she speaks to ranchers and farmers who lose livestock to bears and frequently object that “liberal urbanites are the ones who want predators back on the landscape, but they aren’t the ones suffering the consequences” (p. 177). In Canada, she visits the remarkable tourist town of Churchill at the edge of Hudson Bay which is home to equal numbers of humans and polar bears. To keep people safe while avoiding lethal control methods as much as possible, it relies on an unprecedented amount of technology. Even so, human lives are at risk, and Dickie speaks to a woman who survived a mauling.

Close up of a wet, muddy Grizzly bear in Denali National Park, Alaska, USA. — Full Grizz by Thomas, via flickr.

The chapters focusing on bears in the USA offer some of the most remarkable case studies of people attempting to live alongside bears. The century-long history of black bear management around Yosemite National Park offers “a full-scale experiment of all the ways people and bears can clash” (p. 153). After decades of park management doing things wrong (making a tourist attraction out of bears scavenging on garbage dumps, thus inadvertently training a generation of them how not to forage in the wild), they spent decades trying to do things right. A combination of bear-resistant food storage containers on campgrounds and strict enforcement of rules has trained tourists to be more mindful.

Eight Bears becomes more thought-provoking as it progresses. Here is how it provoked mine. Dickie puts down several relevant dots on paper at different points in the book (mentioning human population growth, climate change, and the resource-hungry global supply chain) but she does not explicitly connect them to draw the contours of the larger challenge ahead. So, here be a tangent, and my attempt to connect those dots, triggered by her repeated interviewing of grizzly bear recovery coordinator Chris Servheen. Upon retirement in 2015, with grizzlies sufficiently recovered, he supported their delisting. However, by 2021, seeing how states were failing to manage grizzly populations “with maturity and grace” (p. 180), he changed his mind. This raises fundamental questions. What is the point of all our conservation efforts if we do not address the root causes that got threatened species in trouble in the first place? For me, books such as Abundant Earth and Alfie & Me have really driven home the point that, unless we change our relationship with the natural world and stop treating it as a bottomless larder, conservation is little more than a palliative solution, a stay of execution. If we restore animals to an increasingly degraded environment, to a human population that does not want to share the world with them, they will have to remain on permanent life support. To be clear, I do not think conservation is futile; it is vital. So long as it is not an end unto itself. We cannot lose sight of the bigger picture: a world hospitable to non-human animals. Servheen’s call for “maturity and grace” in the context of grizzly bear management can just as well be applied to our tenancy of this planet.

Wild Black Bear at Anan Bear Observatory. — Wild Black Bear at Anan Bear Observatory by Andrew Russell, via flickr.

Even if you were to come away from this book without having your thoughts similarly provoked, Eight Bears is a mighty fine environmental reportage that is nuanced and well-researched. Given the often regional nature of books on bears and people, Dickie’s globetrotting overview of the challenges faced by all extant bears is very welcome.

Book Review: What a Bee Knows

***** Tells fascinating tales of bee biology

Leon Vlieger, NHBS Catalogue Editor

The collectives formed by social insects fascinate us, whether it is bees, ants, or termites. But it would be a mistake to think that the individuals making up such collectives are just mindless cogs in a bigger machine. It is entirely reasonable to ask, as pollination ecologist Stephen Buchmann does here, What a Bee Knows. This book was published almost a year after Lars Chittka’s The Mind of a Bee, which I reviewed previously. I ended that review by asking what Buchmann could add to the subject. Actually, despite some unavoidable overlap, a fair amount.

Though I will leave a comparison and recommendation for the end of this review, I can already tell you that What a Bee Knows is a different beast altogether. Buchmann’s approach to convincing you that bees are sophisticated insects is to provide a general and wide-ranging introduction to bee biology, telling you of all the things they get up to.

What makes this introduction accessible to a broad audience is that Buchmann goes back to first principles. For starters, what even is a bee, and where did they come from? You might not realise that they evolved from carnivorous predatory wasps and likely did so some 130 million years ago, not long after the evolution of flowering plants. Another basic aspect Buchmann highlights is how myopically focused we are on social bees. The thing is, 80% of all 20,000+ described bee species are solitary. Their biology is the more representative one and Buchmann discusses examples from their lonesome lives throughout this book, many based on his observations working in the Sonoran Desert of Arizona and elsewhere. He reminds the reader that “we should not think of honey bees as the pinnacle of bee evolution toward which all bee species strive” (p. 32). Theirs is the exception; a high-risk, high-reward strategy to making a living on this planet.

A close up of a bee in flight flying across grass. — Bee in-flight, by Nikk on Flickr.

This approach of introducing basic concepts is applied throughout the book. Thus, we get a brief tour of the gross anatomy of the bee brain, but not before Buchmann explains the basics of the human brain and the structure and workings of neurons. An introduction to sexual selection prefixes the discussion on the many sexual escapades of bees: from scramble competition in cactus bees involving bee brawls (which is exactly what it sounds like), to hilltop lekking in carpenter bees, to alternative reproductive tactics with different male morphs in Centris pallida. Bees can learn to solve problems, improve their performance, and even learn new tricks from other bees, but what is this process called learning, and how widespread is it? Similarly, chapters on sleep, pain, and consciousness all first discuss more broadly what these are and what we know about them in humans and other vertebrate and invertebrate organisms.

Buchmann is a pollination ecologist by training and he cannot help but indulge in a long chapter on pollination. He is on form here and gleefully reminds readers that, next to billboards for pollinators, “flowers are unabashedly plant genitals exposed on a stem for all to see” (p. xiii), while bees act as “surrogate flying flower penises” (p. 78). Though it is traditionally held up as a wholesome form of mutualism, it has elements of an arms race too. As Jeff Ollerton also points out, active pollination, where a pollinator deliberately places pollen on a flower’s stigma, is extremely rare. Rather, the norm is that both pollinators and flowers have their own interests (food and pollination), at heart first and foremost. Sometimes both parties will benefit, but this is not a given. Orchids trick male bees into pseudocopulation with flowers that look and smell just like female bees, dusting them in pollen in the process without offering any nectar. At the other extreme, carpenter bees have become nectar robbers, using their jaws to cut into flowers at their base to access nectar, and thus not providing pollination services. And here is an interesting recent development: studies on the bee microbiome suggest that bees derive some of the microbial life that populates their gut from the flowers on which they forage. In some cases, the proteins contributed by flower microbes might be more nutritious than the pollen grains.

A solitary bee coming out of a nest in the ground with grass and clover around it. — A solitary bee, by Nikk on Flickr.

A chapter on sensory biology is, of course, obligatory and Buchmann covers all relevant topics: the trichromatic vision of bees that extends into the ultraviolet, their perception of polarized light used in navigation, their excellent smell, their hearing (which is more a detection of pressure waves at close range), their taste and tactile senses, their to-us-alien detection of electrical charges (and the electrostatic footprints bees leave on flower petals after a visit), and the still contentious topic of magnetoreception. What was new to me is that the two mobile antennae produce a three-dimensional impression of an odour field, and some nifty experiments that involved crossing their antennae resulted in bees persistently walking away from the source of a smell, indicating that they really do smell in stereo.

Though an accessible and enjoyable romp into bee biology, I do have a few minor quibbles. There is a limited number of general black-and-white illustrations and photos, and the reproduction of the latter is so-so as this is a print-on-demand book. And though What a Bee Knows avoids getting too technical, I do feel that in some places Buchmann wanders a bit off-piste from exploring the inner world of bees into more general fascinating tales of bee biology. Nevertheless, the book achieves its mission of instilling a renewed respect and a better understanding of how bees live.

Having now reviewed both Chittka’s The Mind of a Bee and Buchmann’s What a Bee Knows, how do they compare and which one should you read? Both books broadcast the same message loud and clear: bees are darn sophisticated creatures and even individually are far smarter and more capable than you might initially give them credit for. As mentioned, Buchmann goes back to first principles on many topics and wanders into bee biology more generally, while I remarked that Chittka delivers an information-dense book with numerous explanatory illustrations that is very focused in its approach, talking bees, bees, and the occasional other hymenopteran. Consequently, Buchmann does not delve as deeply into many subjects, though he does discuss some experiments in detail (including Chittka’s work on several occasions). My recommendation would be that general readers with little background in biology or entomology pick, or first start with, What a Bee Knows. Biologists, in particular entomologists, might want to skip straight to Chittka’s The Mind of a Bee and get stuck in the wealth of detail there.

What a Bee Knows by Stephen Buchmann is available from our online bookstore.

Book Review: Ocean Life in the Time of Dinosaurs

***** A richly illustrated entry-level book

In this review, I am revisiting the spectacular diversity of marine reptiles that flourished in the planet’s oceans and waterways during the time of the dinosaurs. After having gone without popular titles on the subject for almost two decades since Richard Ellis’s Sea Dragons in 2005, suddenly we have three. Last year (April–May) I reviewed The Princeton Field Guide to Mesozoic Sea Reptiles and Ancient Sea Reptiles, and mentioned that this book was in the works. Ocean Life in the Time of Dinosaurs was originally published in French in 2021 as La Mer au Temps des Dinosaures by Belin/Humensis and has been translated into English by Mark Epstein. Technically speaking that makes it the first of this recent crop, though the English translation was only published in November 2023, after the aforementioned two works. It brings together four French palaeontologists and one natural history illustrator for a graphics-heavy introduction. So, what is in this book, and how does it compare to the other titles?

Ocean Life in the Time of Dinosaurs breaks down into two halves. The obligatory first short chapter introduces the state of the world during the Mesozoic Era 252–66 million years ago (mya), specifically the position of the continents (the palaeogeography) and the various extinction crises by which we divide this time span. After this, the first half is a very long chapter 2 that discusses all the major and minor groups: the “big three” (ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, and mosasaurs); the groups with survivors today such as the crocodylomorphs and sea turtles; and lesser-known groups such as hupehsuchians and thalattosaurs. The second half of the book consists of five chronological chapters that help you put all this diversity into some sort of logical order. This starts with life’s first coy attempts at reptiles-returning-to-the-sea in the Palaeozoic Era, the main event of the Mesozoic in three chapters (the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous), and the Cenozoic Era in which the survivors of the K–Pg extinction continued and sometimes thrived.

The book’s second half stood out to me for two reasons. First, it helps prevent the same rookie mistake that is often made regarding dinosaurs: they did not all live at the same time. This may sound incredibly obvious and yet is easily and frequently forgotten. Where marine reptiles are concerned, a good example of this is that the ichthyosaurs evolved ~252 mya and went extinct ~90 mya, while the mosasaurs evolved ~100 mya and went extinct 66 mya at the K–Pg boundary, the two groups thus overlapping for “only” 10 million years. Turtles and crocodylomorphs survived the K–Pg extinction and positively flourished, though some groups subsequently went extinct and left no living descendants, such as the dryosaurids (a crocodylomorph lineage, extinct ~40 mya). The second reason I liked this chronological section is that it is largely told through the lens of key fossil localities around the globe (here, among others, Monte San Giorgio, Holzmaden, and the Oxford Clay). Though their names are often familiar and each of these deposits offers a unique view of a certain ecosystem at a certain time, they rarely get much attention themselves. The authors here provide just that little bit of extra information on their geography and stratigraphy, the history of their discovery and exploitation, and the palaeoenvironment that can be deduced from them.

Ocean Life in the Time of Dinosaurs is richly illustrated in full colour with photos, diagrams, and paleoart by Alain Bénéteau, including single and double-page spreads. There are several cladograms mapped onto timelines, with the simplified phylogeny of crocodylomorphs on page 69 particularly useful in visualising the uncertain placement of thalattosuchians. Drawings show unique anatomical adaptations, explaining e.g. the evolution of turtle shells. The text is regularly interspersed with boxes discussing notable species or concepts such as proposed forms of swimming or adaptation of bones to life underwater. In short, the visual presentation of this book is outstanding.

I normally prefer to review each book on its own merits, but given that we now have two richly illustrated introductory books, there is no avoiding the mosasaur in the room. How does Ocean Life in the Time of Dinosaurs stack up against Darren Naish’s Ancient Sea Reptiles? As I also observe about his Dinopedia, Naish is particularly interested in taxonomy and species diversity. Whereas the discussion of the different groups here takes up 55 pages in chapter 2, Naish does this in 132 pages and six chapters. He goes into more detail on taxonomic conundrums and for most groups discusses more species. What the French quartet here adds are the five chronological chapters, extending their coverage of evolutionary events to before and after the Mesozoic. As mentioned, they also give more detail on key fossil sites whereas Naish briefly mentions some of these in his chapter 1. My impression is that palaeontology buffs will want to get both books, despite the inevitable overlap. If, however, you are looking to buy just one book then Ocean Life in the Time of Dinosaurs is the most entry-level of the two, while Ancient Sea Reptiles provides more detail (and in that scenario would be my book of choice). My original observation regarding Greg Paul’s The Princeton Field Guide to Mesozoic Sea Reptiles, that it is more of a reference work to be consulted after either of these books, still holds.

Ocean Life in the Time of Dinosaurs is available from our online bookstore.

Book Review: The Redemption of Wolf 302

**** Tells the story of an unlikely hero

Ever since wolves were reintroduced into Yellowstone National Park in 1995 they have been intently observed by biologists and wolf enthusiasts. Amongst these, biological technician and park ranger Rick McIntyre has to be the most dedicated, having watched these wolves from dawn to dusk every day for around two decades now. The Redemption of Wolf 302 is the third book in the Alpha Wolves of Yellowstone series and tells the story of an unlikely hero.

Though this book can be read by itself, you will get more enjoyment out of the unfolding multi-generational story arc if you read the previous two instalments. Furthermore, McIntyre refers to earlier wolves quite frequently and this book picks up right where The Reign of Wolf 21 ended, meaning the earliest part of wolf 302’s life is not told here. However, a brief introduction brings you up to speed.

One thing this book makes clear is that wolves have individual characters. Whereas wolves 8 and 21 were devoted males looking out for their pack, the current protagonist is anything but. With the death of 21 in 2004, the second-ranking male 253 temporarily takes over but is quickly ousted by two neighbours from the Leopold Pack: 302 and his younger nephew 480. 302, however, is not a natural leader. An increasingly baffled McIntyre spends the first half of the book describing many instances of his unusual behaviour: he runs away during confrontations with other packs, quickly becomes subordinate to his much younger nephew 480, sneakily tries to mate with females when 480 is distracted, occasionally steals food from pups, and is easily spooked by prey carcasses moving when his packmates tear pieces of meat off them. When 302 snoozes on a nearby hill while the Druids battle a rival pack, ignoring their howls, McIntyre seems truly exasperated: “I had been rooting for 302 to do better in life for over four years, but his total noninvolvement as 480 rushed to confront these wolves made me think 302 was a lost cause” (p. 118).

Two black wolves on the waters edge of a pond in the snow. — Yellowstone National Park by NPS / Jacob W. Frank, via flickr.

As a consequence, the first part actually revolves around male 480 who steps up as the new Druid alpha male. Through the years 2005 and 2006 McIntyre witnesses the waxing and waning of power between the packs. Several Druid wolves are killed by the neighbouring Slough Creek pack in 2005 and the Sloughs expand their territory aggressively. The tide turns from 2006 onwards, though, when an unknown pack moves in from the north and subjects the Slough’s breeding den to a brutal siege and later kills its adult males. Subsequent accidents and poor breeding seasons for the Sloughs allow the Druids to regain much of their territory by 2008.

It takes until 2007 for wolf 302 to redeem himself, by which time he is over 6.5 years old, well beyond the average lifespan of wolves in Yellowstone. He finally starts helping the Druid females and pups, and assists male 480 during hunts and fights with other packs. By 2008 he leaves the Druids with a group of yearlings in tow and, together with a female from the Agate Creek pack, forms the newly-named Blacktail pack. In one example of stories coming full circle in this book, 302 takes up residence in the territory of the now-extinct Leopold pack, the same territory he was born in. Without giving away further spoilers, several other storylines come full circle at the end of 302’s life. Although not tugging on the heartstrings quite as much as the story of wolves 21 and 42, I was nevertheless so invested emotionally in the fully-lived lives of these wolves that by the end of the book I struggled to hold back tears. 302 ultimately transitions from a rebel to an alpha wolf deserving of that status.

3 wolves from a yellowstone wolf pack stood on either side of a trench with scrubland all around. — Yellowstone Wolves by Larry Lamsa, via flickr.

If you read the previous books then you know what to expect: no embellished writing but a detailed rendition of McIntyre’s field notes that recounts the day-to-day lives of these wolves. This book retains the same structure as The Reign of Wolf 21: short chapters bundled into parts, one part for each year. McIntyre has reverted to putting just one map with home ranges at the start of the book, together with diagrams of the changing pack compositions over the years. The Reign of Wolf 21 put maps and diagrams at the start of each part, which was a useful convention that helped keep track of all the players. It looks as if McIntyre decided that was not necessary for this book as it follows fewer packs.

Like previous volumes, this book overflows with interesting biological observations on e.g. play behaviour of pups and interactions with other species such as bears and ravens. A notable problem is the outbreak of mange, a mite-caused disease that leads to fur loss. Research using infrared cameras has shown the substantial loss of body heat this causes, and the resulting deterioration of health in the subzero temperatures of Yellowstone winters. McIntyre furthermore uses one chapter to shortly summarize observations on wolf injuries and mortalities that he mentioned in this and the previous two books. His observations mirror those of Wolves on the Hunt which showed wolves regularly suffer serious injuries while hunting prey, from broken ribs to fractured jaws. Sometimes these are fatal, though more wolves die as a result of fights with other wolves.

Close up of two wolves in Hayden Valley, Yellowstone National Park, walking over a snowy ridge. — Wolves in Hayden Valley by NPS / Ashton Hooker, via flickr.

As before, McIntyre rarely inserts himself in the narrative. He mentions notable visitors to the park and personal achievements such as his nine-year streak of daily observations, even when temperatures drop to lows of -44°C. There are two other striking examples of McIntyre’s detachment in this book. One is an incident where he leaves an injured wolf after several hours of observation and finds him dead the next day. McIntyre sticks to an iron rule that he is here to observe, not to interfere, and that means all facets of life and death in the natural world. The second incident is the start of the wolf-hunting season in Montana when wolves are removed from the endangered species list in 2009. The wolves in Yellowstone National Park are still protected, but those venturing outside are at risk. Despite expressing his concern for their safety, he refrains from giving his personal opinion on the hunting of wolves.

This series was originally going to be a trilogy, but by the end, McIntyre foreshadows the subject of the fourth book: the alpha females, particularly female 06. Named after her year of birth, 2006, she was a granddaughter of male 21 and was legendary for her fierce independence. Though she has been the subject of Blakeslee’s book American Wolf, McIntyre is uniquely placed to give an account of her life. For now, wolf aficionados can delight in The Redemption of Wolf 302. With each book, the payoff of following their story in this level of intimate detail is getting bigger – these books are in a class of their own.

The Redemption of Wolf 302 is available from our bookstore.