Reveals the lives hidden behind the names of the world’s reptiles.
Why?
Firstly this is a beautifully produced, satisfyingly stylish book! Now the superficial is out of the way, what’s inside?
Like Bo and co’s previous efforts along these lines – Whose Bird? and the Eponym Dictionary of Mammals – the Dictonary of Reptiles explores the lives of the historical figures ‘immortalised’ in the names of the world’s fauna. Some feature more heavily than others – Darwin, for instance, appearing in the names of nine reptiles (find out more in this post featuring an extract from the book), while other folk such as Dr. Ian Earle Ayrton Kirby (1921-2006), unearther of pre-Colombian artifacts and erstwhile Curator of the St. Vincent and the Grenadines Museum – have the honour of a single beastly namesake – in this instance, Kirby’s Least Gecko, or Sphaerodactylus kirbyi.
This should be an addictive book for anyone interested in the finer details of natural history, the perfect gift for the herpetologist in your life who has everything (else), and will be of particular interest to bibliographic researchers since the titles and publication dates of any known literature written or edited by the subjects is given.
Who?
Bo Beolens, Michael Watkins, andMichael Grayson are the co-authors of The Eponym Dictionary of Mammals, also published by Johns Hopkins.
Edited by Christa P. H. Mulder, Wendy B Anderson, David R Towns and Peter J Bellingham
What?
A large-scale global analysis of the ecology of seabird islands from contributors with experience of fifteen island systems.
Why?
Synthesizing research covering island systems generally across the globe, as opposed to specific groups, the editors have been able to arrange the chapters according to theme, allowing an overview of the factors seabird island systems have in common.
The book looks at the unique effects seabirds have on island ecosystems, the threats from various predators – such as the predatory rats of certain New Zealand island groups – and considers the possibilities and impediments regarding predator eradication, and the implications of efforts towards the restoration of seabirds to islands from which they have been forced out.
Seabird Islands is a timely publication not only for the field of academic ecology, but for conservation professionals concerned with ecosystem management, touching as it does upon the role of stakeholders – NGOs, volunteers, island residents – community participation, and ecotourism.
Who?
Christa Mulder is Associate Professor of Ecology at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Wendy Anderson is Professor of Biology and Environmental Science at Drury University in Springfield, Missouri. David Towns is a Senior Scientist with the Department of Conservation based in Auckland, New Zealand. Peter Bellingham is a research scientist at Landcare Research in Lincoln, near Christchurch, New Zealand.
Edited by Christa P H Mulder, Wendy B Anderson, David R Towns and Peter Bellingham
This book, written collaboratively by and for ecologists and resource managers, provides the first large-scale cross-system compilation, comparison, and synthesis of the ecology of seabird island systems. Offering a new conceptual framework into which to fit the impacts of seabirds on island ecology, this is an essential resource for academics and resource managers alike.
The Kittiwake has been the subject of behavioural research since the late 1950s – one of the longest running studies in the world. In this new Poyser monograph, John Coulson summarises these decades of research, revealing amazing insights into the life of these gulls, with wider implications for the behavioural ecology of all colonial birds. There are sections on life at sea, nest-site selection, breeding biology, feeding ecology, colony dynamics, moult, survivorship and conservation.
The introductory sections to this excellent guide cover current legislation, the BTO’s Nest Record Scheme and advice about finding and monitoring nests without affecting the outcome of the breeding attempt. Importantly, it also explains why there is a need to monitor nests. Along with survival rates, breeding success determines whether a species increases or decreases in population. Monitoring helps explain some declines and contributes towards the creation of conservation initiatives.
The bulk of the book is made up of species accounts in the traditional field-guide format, with one or two pages per species. A total of 146 breeding birds is included, with Schedule 1 species – rarer birds whose nesting sites cannot be approached without a licence – omitted. For each, there is a map, a summary of the dates when eggs and young can be found, colour pictures of the adult, eggs and newly hatched young, and details of breeding ecology and tips on the best methods for finding and monitoring nests.
The BTO hopes that this guide will encourage more birders to become involved in nest recording for conservation purposes. The numbers of nests being monitored has been dropping rapidly for some species, particularly open-nesting passerines, which could hinder efforts to understand why their populations are in decline. However, the comprehensive information covered in this guide will be of interest even if you do not want to take part in nest recording. It may even help to change your mind!
Arguably the premier birding county in the country, Norfolk already has a detailed and highly readable avifauna to its credit. The Birds of Norfolk team of co-authors incuded county stalwart Moss Taylor, who links up in this new volume with the British Trust for Ornithology’s John Marchant to present the results of eight years of summer and winter mapping undertaken by an army of fieldworkers.
Surveying for the last Norfolk Atlas ended in 1985, so there was clearly a need for an update – a lot can and has changed in two decades. Geoffrey Kelly’s The Norfolk Bird Atlas also only covered breeding species, so this latest work adds significantly to knowledge of the county’s birds, with current winter distributions also fully mapped.
The premise, planning and methods are set out in full in 18 introductory pages which precede the meat of the book, the species accounts. Some 270 species are covered: those present year-round typically have three maps to show summer and winter ranges and changes since the previous atlas, while summer visitors have range and change maps, and those present only in winter or recently added as breeding species get a single map accordingly. The historical and current status of all are described informatively in an accompanying narrative.
There is a wealth of information to be absorbed from the accounts and maps, and to set the scene the reader could do worse than turn to John Marchant’s overview of Norfolk’s birds at the back of the book. Here, we learn among many other things that the county was home to about 900,000 pairs of breeding birds of 135 regular species during the survey period; that there were some 3.1 million wintering birds in the county of 183 regular species; that Woodpigeon was both the most abundant breeding and wintering species; that the county holds more than 50 per cent of the country’s breeding Marsh and Montagu’s Harriers; and that Red-backed Shrike, Wood Warbler and Winchat have all been lost as breeding birds since the last atlas, but up to 14 more species probably or definitely nested for the fist time in the same period.
All of this fascinating information is presented in a well-designed package, with double-page species spreads enlivened particularly by an excellent selection of illustrations and colour photos, many of the latter by David Tipling. Branded ‘A BTO Bird Atlas’, the format is presumably a template for a series of reinvigorated county atlases by the Norfolk-based Trust, which 20 years ago moved its headquarters to Thetford.
As gathering of data from observers becomes faster and more efficient through online schemes such as the BTO’s BirdTrack project, as well as through dedicated grid-based surveys such as this, it may be that the relevance of mapped atlases like Norfolk’s new tome will overtake that of conventional county avifaunas.
Charles Robert Darwin (1809-1882) was the prime advocate, together with Wallace, of Natural Selection as the way in which speciation occurs. To quote from his most famous work On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection (1859), “I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term Natural Selection.” Darwin was the naturalist on ‘HMS Beagle’ on her scientific expedition round the world (1831-1836). In South America he found fossils of extinct animals that were similar to extant species. On the Galapagos Islands he noticed many variations among plants and animals of the same general type as those in South America. On his return to London he conducted research on his notes and specimens. Out of this study grew several related theories; evolution did occur; evolutionary change was gradual, taking thousands or even millions of years; the primary mechanism for evolution was a process called Natural Selection; and the millions of species alive today arose from a single original life form through a branching process called ‘speciation’. Four mammals, three amphibians and several birds (including those famous finches) are named after him.
Henry Nicholas Ridley (1855-1956) was a British botanist and collector on the island of Fernando de Noronha (1887), when he first reported the sightings of Olive Ridley Turtles in Brazil. However, it seems unlikely that the ‘Ridley’ in the turtle’s name refers to him. There are several theories including one that states that it was a ‘riddle’ where they came from and ‘riddle’ became pronounced ‘riddlie’ and so ‘ridley’. Ridley was known as ‘Mad Ridley’ or ‘Rubber Ridley’, as he was keen to get the rubber tree transplanted to British territory. He was Superintendent, Tropical Gardens, Singapore (1888-1912), where early experiments in growing the tree outside Brazil took place. He wrote The habits of Malay reptiles (1889). Two mammals and a bird are named after him.
Dr Patrick Russell (1726-1805) was a British surgeon and naturalist. He first went to India (1781) to look after his brother who was employed by the Honourable East India Company in Vizagapatnam. He became fascinated by the plants in the region and was appointed to be the Company’s Botanist and Naturalist, Madras Presidency (1785). He spent 6 years in Madras (Chennai) and sent a large collection of snakes to the British Museum (1791). One of his major concerns was snakebite and he tried to find a way for people to identify poisonous snakes, without first getting bitten and seeing what happened! The sand boa has his name attached to it because it appears to mimic Russell’s Viper: something he commented on in his A continuation of an account of Indian Serpents (1801).
The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles is published by Johns Hopkins University Press, and is due to be published on the 24th September 2011
Andrew Allott takes us on a journey through the Welsh Marches; Cheshire, Shropshire, Herefordshire and Monmouthshire, the border counties of England and Wales. He traces the various strands that weave together the natural history and deep past of the area with the impact of human civilisation and the growth of agriculture and industry. The well-defined chapter topics bring the area to life to create a whole picture of the region:
From the Author’s Foreword and Acknowledgements:
“The author’s aim has been to explore themes, rather than to catalogue isolated or inconsequential facts. Each chapter takes one theme and considers its relevance across much or all of the Marches.”
The plentiful illustrations, photographs and diagrams complement the natural history making this a full and satisfying survey of the area.
Who?
Andrew Allott studied Botany at Oxford University and then became a schoolmaster, teaching initially in Canterbury and then at Shrewsbury School in Shropshire, where he is now Head of Biology. Although an incomer to the Marches, Andrew Allott has developed a deep love of the landscape, geology, flora and fauna of the area. He has also developed great respect for the many talented amateur naturalists and the professional scientists whose work is doing so much to explain the natural history of the Marches and to promote its conservation.
Horsey Estate, in Norfolk, has, since 1979, been home to a colony of resident, and eventually breeding, Common Cranes. John Buxton has been resident on the estate a little longer, and was perhaps the perfect host to his surprise new neighbours…
John Buxton
What a fascinating story – how did you feel when you first heard that there were cranes resident in Norfolk, on the Horsey Estate? What do you think attracted them to the site?
In October ’79 I was delighted when Frank Starling, the grazing tenant, had reported he had just seen “the 2 biggest bloody herons” on the marshes on which he grazed his cattle. The attraction to the cranes was a combination of a quiet, undisturbed area of wetland and a plentiful supply of food in the form of unharvested potatoes. Both sites were within the Horsey Estate area.
How did the writing of the book come about? What brought you two together and why now?
For the first few years I tried to keep the presence and nesting activity as quiet as possible but I felt the story would have to come out eventually. I was worried that inaccuracies would begin to creep in because various interested people were longing to report facts as they saw them. I wrote down careful notes about the cranes’ activities and as I learnt more about them and their habits I realised that at some stage in the future, I should recall the true story as it happened. Chris Durdin was given a sabbatical period while still employed by the RSPB in 2009 to gather and write down the facts as told by me from my notes and diaries I had kept about the cranes over the last 20 years. The work became delayed for various reasons but finally, in 2011, it simply had to be completed.
The first part of the book follows the cranes and their efforts (sometimes exhausting!) to breed year by year from 1979 to 2010. How was 2011 for them?
2011 was a fairly unsuccessful breeding summer for the cranes at Horsey, one pair definitely hatched young by my observations of their activity from a fixed hide at 200 metres. I could not see the young in fast growing reed but could observe the parents by their tall necks showing above those reeds. I was aware also that the young only survived a few days and I witnessed a male marsh harrier, which had nested only 50 yards away from the cranes’ nest, carrying a small gold creature as prey, which he took to feed his young. Another pair of cranes in a different site within the Horsey Estate also failed to raise any young.
What was it like revisiting the history of the years from 1979 – particularly going back through all the notebooks?
It was quite revealing to catch up with my notes, which acted usefully as a reminder of the facts over 30 years. Thanks to Chris Durdin’s patience, we finally achieved the publishing of the book.
Grus grus, the Common or Eurasian Crane, at Horsey
The Norfolk cranes are grus grus, or Common Crane, and the book is full of observations on crane behaviour. The word ‘tenacity’ is used in the book to describe these birds and their endless attempts at sucessful breeding. How would you sum up the typical crane personality?
Like all individuals of a species, cranes vary in personality, I have observed particular traits in quite a few individuals, which I had got to know fairly intimately from fixed hides. The females are undoubtedly the best parents, with remarkable tenacity and sense of duty at the incubation and subsequent caring for chicks. The males are usually less reliable in their duties. Incubation is normally shared but I have seen many examples of the male going walkabout when he should be sitting on the eggs. This can be fatal if we have late frosts in May. One particular pair have only hatched young once in 4 years of nesting attempts.
What has been the cranes’ legacy in terms of their effect on your life experience, personally and professionally?
The cranes establishing themselves in Broadland, after a break of 400 years, is a major event in UK bird conservation. It has kept me extremely busy, looking after them for 30 years and although my son, Robin, since 2000 is now the lessee of the Horsey Estate from the National Trust, I am acting as his reserve warden. A job which he would never have had time to undertake as a busy, self-employed land agent. My present age is 83 and I am extremely lucky to be able to both physically cope with wardening the Horsey reserve and still enthusiastically enjoy photographing wildlife in high definition video and digital imaging with a still camera.
As far as I am personally concerned, with a wonderful wife and family around as backup, I am as fully occupied as I have ever been, doing things I enjoy with great enthusiasm.
I am hugely relieved that the book has been published at last and deeply grateful to Chris in particular, and among others, Nick Upton, for his invaluable contribution and chapter about cranes in Europe.
Chris Durdin
Chris Durdin worked for the RSPB for 30 years and was in the Norwich office while the cranes were establishing themselves…
Chris, how did you become involved with the cranes?
Not long after I arrived at the RSPB’s Norwich office, I was told in confidence about the nesting cranes and asked to help in several ways, including some shifts watching a nest in the spring of 1982. Regular contact with John continued, but it wasn’t hands-on as he and Bridget looked after the RSPB contract wardens who helped at Horsey for several years.
You were in charge for a time of deflecting public and media interest in the cranes at the RSPB office – what was it like trying to keep the cranes secret?
It helped that there was a rumour in the birdwatching world that the cranes had escaped from captivity, so on that basis they didn’t really count as wild birds. We didn’t discourage that perception, which lessened the pressure and risk of disturbance to nesting birds in spring and summer. They were fairly easy to see in autumn and winter from the coast road, so it was easy enough to encourage birdwatchers to look then. Of course there were well-informed birdwatchers and media, especially after juvenile cranes that were clearly recently fledged started to appear. Those in the know seemed to accept the need for care with this privileged information, though naturally some keener media were referred to John, who batted queries into the long grass.
How does the Norfolk Cranes’ story fit in the context of current conservation issues and efforts in the UK today, and how could organisations and government best serve the potential future of cranes in the UK?
We can start by remembering that they disappeared from the UK as breeding birds some 400 years ago due to a combination of hunting and wetland loss. So no hunting and lots of big wetlands are obvious messages – all the British birds are on large, protected wetlands, mostly nature reserves. That this includes a re-created wetland at RSPB Lakenheath Fen is particularly encouraging. Cranes are big, talismanic birds, and we hope they are an easy-to-grasp way of showing the value of wetland protection and creation to the public and to Government. Cranes have a preference for large, undisturbed wetlands, so they are also a reminder of the value of large-scale habitat protection and restoration.
Crane in flight
So, can we expect our skies to be full of cranes in the near future?
No, but they should be a more familiar part of the scene in small numbers in a few areas. It’s taken more than 30 years to go from their natural re-colonisation at Horsey to about a dozen pairs in Eastern England, so we all need great patience. An exception to that is if you’re lucky enough to live where the process is being speeded up in SW England, where cranes are being reintroduced in Somerset. While we hope the spread will accelerate, probably boosted by more immigrants from the expanding – in both numbers and range – European population, cranes will probably never be common, given their preference for large wetlands.
If you’d like to see skies full of cranes, the answer is to go where they form flocks in several parts of Europe. One of the best places to go is Extremadura in Spain where up to 100,000 cranes over-winter. I will be there with Honeyguide Wildlife Holidays in February 2012!
Thanks to everyone who came to the NHBS stand at Birdfair 2011, it was a great weekend and we look forward to seeing you all again next year. Here is our 2011 experience in photos:
The NHBS stand wins another award this year!
The NHBS stand at Birdfair 2011
NHBS Ambassador Nick Baker meets customers on the stand
Getting serious about bugs…
As if on queue, a Dor Beetle arrives to prove Nick’s credentials
Nick signs copies of his Bug Book
Nick and Nigel
David Lindo, The Urban Birder, and friend
The Stealth Gear One-Man Chair Hide in all its glory!
John Altringham, author of Bats: From Evolution to Conservation, discusses the appeal of bats, what they are, and how we should think about their conservation needs.
How did you first become interested in studying bats?
I was taken to a Natterer’s bat roost, almost 30 years ago now, and saw my first bat close up. I was a research scientist in biomechanics – trying to understand evolution’s engineering problems and solutions. This tiny bundle of energy in my hand was an engineering marvel I’d never really thought about, so I went away and read about bats. However, I didn’t read just about flight and echolocation, the subjects that came immediately to mind. As a zoologist and conservationist, I read more and more widely and became increasingly fascinated. Bats became an important ‘extra-curricular’ activity, but it was many years before they displaced biomechanics in my work. However, the seeds were most definitely sown during that very first encounter.
We all know what bats are, but – what exactly is a bat?
A bat is the only flying mammal and one of nature’s few echolocators. With these ‘skills’ it has evolved and radiated into the most diverse, the most widespread and the second most speciose group of mammals on the planet. A bat is a small mammal with the lifestyle of its much bigger cousins. It lives a long time, but only produces one baby a year. It lives within often complex social units, exhibiting complex behaviours, and makes use of the landscape on a grandiose scale through the seasons. It shows a bewildering range of ways that an animal can makes its way in the world. It is an important cog in many ecosystems, as predator, pollinator, seed disperser. Its contributions to the human economies of the world are only now being determined and appreciated. Likewise its value as an indicator of the planet’s health. It is a source of endless fascination, study and appreciation.
Why do you think there is such popular interest at this time in bat detection and conservation, and what can we learn from studying their ecology?
I really think that bats sell themselves. The formation of the bat conservation movement, some knowledgeable and enthusiastic activists and some cracking documentary footage are the catalysts in the bat conservation movement – the bats themselves do the rest, if we just show the world something of them.
Bats are also surprisingly accessible. It is relatively easy, even in suburban areas, to see and hear bats, sometimes at fairly close quarters – you can’t say that about many wild mammals. They often live in close proximity to humans, you don’t have to be particularly stealthy, and they just get on with life while you watch – they have a lot to offer the casual naturalist. However, there are plenty of challenges for the more dedicated naturalist.
The need for conservation is pretty self-evident. Bats need large home ranges in connected landscapes, they rely on threatened habitats for both roosting and feeding and they are slow to recover from population setbacks. However, there are modest things we can do to help them, from practical conservation to education, which encourages widespread involvement – and success fuels further effort. Conservation needs passion and commitment – bats appear to have the charisma to generate them.
Conservation gets a big chapter in the book – it is the focus of a large and growing proportion of ecological research. There has been a lot of bridge building between research ecologists and conservation practitioners in recent years, but we still have some way to go. I’ve tried to highlight some of the issues in this chapter – evidence-based conservation is the future!
What can we learn from bats? Where do I start?! Science is all about understanding how the natural world works. Everything we learn, from the ecology of individual species to the general processes that govern the way ecosystems function, comes from the study of appropriate ‘models’. The sheer diversity of bats means that they offer useful models to study all sorts of things – just look at the topics I cover in the book.
How do you see the future for bats?
I have no idea what the future holds, for bats or the rest of biodiversity. I do think bats are among the more vulnerable animals, so looking after bats is a good way to protect other animals and plants that share their habitats. We have a growing knowledge about what we are doing wrong to our environment and what we need to do to begin to put things right. However, there is a lack of will among politicians and the ‘captains’ of commerce and industry to provide the conditions and the resources to do it. Lots of talking the talk, little walking the walk. Conservation will always be a compromise – but the balance point is far from the right place. Too many people still think of conservation in terms of what we sacrifice to achieve it, not what we gain from it. We need more objective science in conservation, alongside the passion and hard work. They provide the evidence that forces people to act and they help us to decide how to use most effectively the limited resources we have at our disposal.
NHBS stock an extensive range of bat conservation equipment, supplying a range of customers from ecological consultants needing bulk stock for a construction project, to amateur naturalists keen to investigate their local bat population and do their bit for conservation.
A photographic guide to the natural history and field identification of the “strange lumps and bumps that we call galls…” (Introduction, p5).
Why?
Plant galls are a great subject of research for the amateur naturalist. Bridging the sciences of botany and entomology, they are a fascinating example of the symbiotic interdependence of nature, and the diversity of their size and appearance – from exquisitely attractive orb-like features and spiked swellings, to leaf blisters and discolourations – gives the interested naturalist a satisfying range of study.
The reader is taken on a guided tour of the galls arranged according to their host plants for ease of identification, and there are over 200 detailed colour photographs of the commonest galls to be found among Britain’s 1,000 species. The interaction between insect and plant which results in the gall is briefly described in each case, and the book contains a general introduction to the subject.
Who?
Michael Chinery is best known for his field guides to insects and other creepy-crawlies, especially those that occur in our gardens, and for his numerous books encouraging young people to explore and enjoy the countryside and its wildlife. Insects and wild flowers fascinated him from a very early age and this led inevitably to an interest in plant galls, with their intimate mix of plant and animal life. He joined the British Plant Gall Society soon after its formation in 1985, and has been editing the Society’s journal, Cecidology, since 1990.
Why?
