Download or read book Imperial Dreams written by Tim Gallagher and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-04-16 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A decade ago, Tim Gallagher was one of the rediscoverers of the legendary ivory-billed woodpecker, which most scientists believed had been extinct for more than half a century—now Gallagher once again hits the trail, journeying deep into Mexico’s savagely beautiful Sierra Madre Occidental, home to rich wildlife, as well as to Mexican drug cartels, in a perilous quest to locate the most elusive bird in the world—the imperial woodpecker. The imperial woodpecker’s trumpetlike calls and distinctive hammering on massive pines once echoed through the high forests. Two feet tall, with deep black plumage, a brilliant snow-white shield on its back, and a crimson crest, the imperial woodpecker had largely disappeared fifty years ago, though reports persist of the bird still flying through remote mountain stands. In an attempt to find and protect the imperial woodpecker in its last habitat, Gallagher is guided by a map of sightings of this natural treasure of the Sierra Madre, bestowed on him by a friend on his deathbed. Charged with continuing the quest of a line of distinguished naturalists, including the great Aldo Leopold, Gallagher treks through this mysterious, historically untamed and untamable territory. Here, where an ancient petroglyph of the imperial can still be found, Geronimo led Apaches in their last stand, William Randolph Hearst held a storied million-acre ranch, and Pancho Villa once roamed, today ruthless drug lords terrorize residents and steal and strip the land. Gallagher’s passionate quest takes a harrowing turn as he encounters armed drug traffickers, burning houses, and fleeing villagers. His mission becomes a life-and-death drama that will keep armchair adventurers enthralled as he chases truth in the most dangerous of habitats.
Download or read book Ash flow Tuffs written by Charles Edward Chapin and published by Geological Society of America. This book was released on 1979 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book God s Middle Finger written by Richard Grant and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2008-03-04 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the acclaimed author of Dispatches From Pluto and Deepest South of All, a harrowing travelogue into Mexico’s lawless Sierra Madre mountains. Twenty miles south of the Arizona-Mexico border, the rugged, beautiful Sierra Madre mountains begin their dramatic ascent. Almost 900 miles long, the range climbs to nearly 11,000 feet and boasts several canyons deeper than the Grand Canyon. The rules of law and society have never taken hold in the Sierra Madre, which is home to bandits, drug smugglers, Mormons, cave-dwelling Tarahumara Indians, opium farmers, cowboys, and other assorted outcasts. Outsiders are not welcome; drugs are the primary source of income; murder is all but a regional pastime. The Mexican army occasionally goes in to burn marijuana and opium crops—the modern treasure of the Sierra Madre—but otherwise the government stays away. In its stead are the drug lords, who have made it one of the biggest drug-producing areas in the world. Fifteen years ago, journalist Richard Grant developed what he calls "an unfortunate fascination" with this lawless place. Locals warned that he would meet his death there, but he didn't believe them—until his last trip. During his travels Grant visited a folk healer for his insomnia and was prescribed rattlesnake pills, attended bizarre religious rituals, consorted with cocaine-snorting policemen, taught English to Guarijio Indians, and dug for buried treasure. On his last visit, his reckless adventure spiraled into his own personal heart of darkness when cocaine-fueled Mexican hillbillies hunted him through the woods all night, bent on killing him for sport. With gorgeous detail, fascinating insight, and an undercurrent of dark humor, God's Middle Finger brings to vivid life a truly unique and uncharted world.
Download or read book Geology of M xico written by Susana A. Alaniz-Álvarez and published by Geological Society of America. This book was released on 2007-01-01 with total page 478 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Chiricahua Mountains written by and published by University of Arizona Press. This book was released on 2003-10 with total page 103 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For many, these mountains represent the Apache stronghold of Geronimo. For others, they are a birdwatcher's paradise. But the Chiricahua Mountains of southeastern Arizona are more than this. They are a classic "sky island" of the desert, a rich storehouse of biologic diversity. The Chiricahuas comprise the largest single range in southern Arizona, crisscrossed by more than 300 miles of trails. Lamberton is your guide along these trails, and his knowledge of the mountains and their natural history makes him a perfect hiking companion, while Jeff Garton's stunning photographs enrich your visit. Lamberton shares insights about the geology, habitats, and diversity of wildlife in a place of such isolation that species must either adapt or become extinct. We learn why the Chiricahuas are so popular with birders, who flock to these mountains from around the world in hopes of spotting some of the nearly four hundred avian species found here. We also learn something of the Chiricahua's rich human culture, from Apache warriors to European settlers. Gracing the text are more than a dozen black-and-white photographs by Garton that offer views of the Chiricahuas different from those usually found in tourist brochures: landscapes and riparian settings, rock formations and plant studies that give readers a lasting impression of the beauty and tranquility of this wilderness. Together, words and images convey an intimate view of one of the Southwest's most exotic locations - stronghold, paradise, and everlasting island in the vast and rolling desert.
Download or read book Tarahumara written by Bernard L. Fontana and published by University of Arizona Press. This book was released on 1997-09 with total page 164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Inhabiting the Sierra Madre Occidental of southwestern Chihuahua in Mexico, the Tarahumara (or Rar‡muri) are known in their language as the "foot runners" due to the way in which they must navigate their rugged terrain. This book offers an accessible ethnography of their history, customs, and current life, accompanied by photographs that offer striking images of these gentle people. The subtitle of the book derives from the Tarahumar's belief that the soul works at night while the body sleeps and that during this "day of the moon" both the spirits of the dead and the souls of the living move about in their mysterious ways. As the authors observe, the fact that "so many men, women, and children persist in distinctive, centuries-old cultural traditions in spite of their nearness to all the complexities and attractions of modern industrial society is an importatn part of the story." Their book tells that story and brings readers closer to understanding the Tarahumara world and way of life.
Download or read book Fire and Climatic Change in Temperate Ecosystems of the Western Americas written by Thomas T. Veblen and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2006-05-10 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Both fire and climatic variability have monumental impacts on the dynamics of temperate ecosystems. These impacts can sometimes be extreme or devastating as seen in recent El Nino/La Nina cycles and in uncontrolled fire occurrences. This volume brings together research conducted in western North and South America, areas of a great deal of collaborative work on the influence of people and climate change on fire regimes. In order to give perspective to patterns of change over time, it emphasizes the integration of paleoecological studies with studies of modern ecosystems. Data from a range of spatial scales, from individual plants to communities and ecosystems to landscape and regional levels, are included. Contributions come from fire ecology, paleoecology, biogeography, paleoclimatology, landscape and ecosystem ecology, ecological modeling, forest management, plant community ecology and plant morphology. The book gives a synthetic overview of methods, data and simulation models for evaluating fire regime processes in forests, shrublands and woodlands and assembles case studies of fire, climate and land use histories. The unique approach of this book gives researchers the benefits of a north-south comparison as well as the integration of paleoecological histories, current ecosystem dynamics and modeling of future changes.
Download or read book Bandit Roads written by Richard Grant and published by Abacus. This book was released on 2009-10-01 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There are many ways to die in the Sierra Madre, a notorious nine-hundred-mile mountain range in northern Mexico where AK-47s are fetish objects, the law is almost non-existent and power lies in the hands of brutal drug mafias. Thousands of tons of opium and marijuana are produced there every year. Richard Grant thought it would be a good idea to travel the length of the Sierra Madre and write a book about it. He was warned before he left that he would be killed. But driven by what he calls 'an unfortunate fascination' for this mysterious region, Grant sets off anyway. In a remarkable piece of investigative writing, he evokes a sinister, surreal landscape of lonely mesas, canyons sometimes deeper than the Grand Canyon, hostile villages and an outlaw culture where homicide is the most common cause of death and grandmothers sell cocaine. Finally his luck runs out and he finds himself fleeing for his life, pursued by men who would murder a stranger in their territory 'to please the trigger finger'.
Download or read book Peyote Hunt written by Barbara G. Myerhoff and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 1976 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Ramón Medina Silva, a Huichol Indian shaman priest or mara'akame, instructed me in many of his culture's myths, rituals, and symbols, particularly those pertaining to the sacred untiy of deer, maize, and peyote. The significance of this constellation of symbols was revealed to me most vividly when I accompanied Ramón on the Huichol's annual ritual return to hunt the peyote in the sacred land of Wirikuta, in myth and probably in history the place from which the Ancient Ones (ancestors and deities of the present-day Indians) came before settling in their present home in the mountains of the Sierra Madre Occidental in north-central Mexico. My work with Ramón preceded and followed our journey, but it was this peyote hunt that held the key to, and constituted the climax of, his teachings."--from the Preface
Download or read book Cenozoic Tectonics and Volcanism of Mexico written by Hugo Delgado-Granados and published by Geological Society of America. This book was released on 2000 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Mexico and the United States written by Lee Stacy and published by Marshall Cavendish. This book was released on 2002-10 with total page 972 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines the history and culture of Mexico and its relations with its neighbors to the north and east from the Spanish Conquest to the current presidency of Vicente Fox.
Download or read book The Southern Cordillera and Beyond written by José Jorge Aranda Gómez and published by Geological Society of America. This book was released on 2012-01-01 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Gentry s R o Mayo Plants written by Paul Schultz Martin and published by University of Arizona Press. This book was released on 1998-09 with total page 584 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Río Mayo region of northwestern Mexico is a major geographic area whose natural history remains poorly known to outsiders. Lying in a region where desert and tropical, northern and southern, and continental and coastal species converge, it boasts an abundance of flora first documented by Howard Scott Gentry in 1942 in a book now widely regarded as a classic of botanical literature. This new book updates and amends Gentry's Río Mayo Plants. Undertaken with Gentry's support and participation before his death in 1993, it reproduces the original text, which appears here with annotations, and contains information on over 2,800 taxa—more than twice the 1,200 species first described by Gentry. The annotated list of plants includes information on distribution, habitat, appearance, common names, and indigenous uses. A new introduction provides historical background and a review of geography and vegetation. It also describes changes to the land and river wrought by agricultural development, expanded grazing, and lumbering. Throughout the text, the authors have endeavored to provide information on Río Mayo vegetation while emphasizing local knowledge and use of plants, to preserve Gentry's field-oriented focus, and to present botanical information with Gentry's exuberance and style. Río Mayo Plants has long stood as a book that displays a scientist's love of the English language, his fondness for native peoples, and his eye for beauty in nature. This updating of that work fills a gap in the botanical literature of this portion of North America and will be useful not only for botanists but also for biogeographers, taxonomists, land managers, and conservationists.
Download or read book Folk Mammalogy of the Northern Pimans written by Amadeo M. Rea and published by University of Arizona Press. This book was released on 1998-10 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Knowledge held about animals by Pima-speaking Native Americans of Arizona and northwest Mexico is intimately entwined with their way of lifeÑa way that is fading from memory as beavers and wolves vanish also from the Southwest. Ethnobiologist Amadeo Rea has conducted extensive fieldwork among the Northern Pimans and here shares what these people know about mammals and how mammals affect their lives. Rea describes the relationship of the River Pima, Tohono O'odham (Papago), Pima Bajo, and Mountain Pima to the furred creatures of their environment: how they are named and classified, hunted, prepared for consumption, and incorporated into myth. He also identifies associations between mammals and Piman notions of illness by establishing correlations between the geographical distribution of mammals and ideas regarding which animals do or do not cause staying sickness. This information reveals how historical and ecological factors can directly influence the belief systems of a people. At the heart of the book are detailed species accounts that relate Piman knowledge of the bats, rabbits, rodents, carnivores, and hoofed mammals in their world, encompassing creatures ranging from deer mouse to mule deer, cottontail to cougar. Rea has been careful to emphasize folk knowledge in these accounts by letting the Pimans tell their own stories about mammals, as related in transcribed conversations. This wide-reaching study encompasses an area from the Rio Yaqui to the Gila River and the Gulf of California to the Sierra Madre Occidental and incorporates knowledge that goes back three centuries. Folk Mammalogy of the Northern Pimans preserves that knowledge for scholars and Pimans alike and invites all interested readers to see natural history through another people's eyes.
Download or read book Library of Congress Subject Headings written by Library of Congress and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 1164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Biotic Communities written by David Earl Brown and published by . This book was released on 1994 with total page 362 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Biotic Communities catalogs and defines by biome, or biotic community, the region centered on Arizona, New Mexico, Sonora, Chihuahua, and Baja California Norte, plus portions of California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Texas, Coahuila, Sinaloa, and Baja California Sur. This ambitious guide is an essential companion for anyone working in natural resources management and ecological research, as well as nonspecialists looking for solid information about a particular southwestern locale. Biotic Communities is arranged by climatic formation with a short chapter for each biome describing climate, physiognomy, distribution, dominant and common plant species, and characteristic vertebrates. Subsequent chapters contain careful descriptions of zonal subdivisions.
Download or read book Library of Congress Subject Headings written by Library of Congress. Cataloging Policy and Support Office and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 1924 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
