Download or read book The Honeyeaters Tree written by Andy Gibb and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2010 with total page 259 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A quest for this quintessentially antipodean family of birds uncovers the tree of life and the landscapes of Australia and New Zealand. From the UK and a Singapore stopover, the traveller journeys to a week around Perth. Then two months in a campervan from Adelaide to Cairns, Queensland. He learns how the tree of life connects the whole globe. The route also skirts floods and cyclones. A fortnight in Tasmania and Victoria, with its fatal fires, concludes this far from straightforward quest for the 73 honeyeaters. Finally, New Zealand offers a coda with its own branch of the family. It's not just about birds: it's a last chance to witness other survivors from the Triassic as they struggle against the latest mass extinction. Railways, cities and culture shock also play cameo roles.
Download or read book New Guinea written by Bruce M. Beehler and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2020-05-19 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An enthralling exploration of the biologically richest island on Earth, featuring more than 200 spectacular color images by award-winning National Geographic photographer Tim Laman In this beautiful book, Bruce Beehler, a renowned author and expert on New Guinea, and award-winning National Geographic photographer Tim Laman take the reader on an unforgettable journey through the natural and cultural wonders of the world's grandest island. Skillfully combining a wealth of information, a descriptive and story-filled narrative, and more than 200 stunning color photographs, the book unlocks New Guinea's remarkable secrets like never before. Lying between the Equator and Australia's north coast, and surrounded by the richest coral reefs on Earth, New Guinea is the world's largest, highest, and most environmentally complex tropical island—home to rainforests with showy rhododendrons, strange and colorful orchids, tree-kangaroos, spiny anteaters, ingenious bowerbirds, and spectacular birds of paradise. New Guinea is also home to more than a thousand traditional human societies, each with its own language and lifestyle, and many of these tribes still live in isolated villages and serve as stewards of the rainforests they inhabit. Accessible and authoritative, New Guinea provides a comprehensive introduction to the island's environment, animals, plants, and traditional rainforest cultures. Individual chapters cover the island's history of exploration; geology; climate and weather; biogeography; plantlife; insects, spiders, and other invertebrates; freshwater fishes; snakes, lizards, and frogs; birdlife; mammals; paleontology; paleoanthropology; cultural and linguistic diversity; surrounding islands and reefs; the pristine forest of the Foja Mountains; village life; and future sustainability. Complete with informative illustrations and a large, detailed map, New Guinea offers an enchanting account of the island's unequalled natural and cultural treasures.
Download or read book Australian Good Birding Guide Victoria written by Ted Wnorowski and published by Ted and Alex Wnorowski. This book was released on 2018-08-30 with total page 506 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the third book in the series of comprehensive guidebooks to birdwatching destinations in Australia. Similarly to the other books in the series, the Victorian guide delivers a detailed record of birdwatching locations within the State. The authors toured from the Southern Ocean-swept shores to all corners of the dry interior to assess and select the best, reasonably accessible birding spots. Description of each birding site includes, at a minimum, habitat description, site facilities and key avifauna. The authors have cross-checked and supplemented their findings with the verified sightings reported online. Book 1: Australian Good Birding Guide: NSW-ACT Book 2: Australian Good Birding Guide: Tasmania
Download or read book Australian Good Birding Guide Southern Central Queensland written by Ted Wnorowski and published by Ted and Alex Wnorowski. This book was released on 2019-05-01 with total page 534 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the fourth book in the series of comprehensive guidebooks to birdwatching destinations in Australia. The Southern and Central QLD guide describes the most interesting and reasonably accessible birding spots located in the southern half of the vast Queensland State. Description of each birding site includes, at a minimum, habitat description, site facilities and key avifauna. The authors have cross-checked and supplemented their findings with verified sightings reported online. www.australian-good-birding-guide.com Other books by Ted & Alex Wnorowski: Australian Good Birdwatching Guide: NSW-ACT Australian Good Birdwatching Guide: Tasmania Australian Good Birdwatching Guide: Victoria In preparation: Australian Good Birdwatching Guide: Northern Queensland.
Download or read book Queensland s Threatened Animals written by Lee K. Curtis and published by CSIRO PUBLISHING. This book was released on 2012 with total page 467 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Queensland is home to 70% of Australia's native mammals (226 species), over 70% of native birds (630 species), just over half of the nation's native reptiles (485) and native frogs (127), and more than 11,000 native plant species. Hundreds of these have a threatened status. In order for Queensland to maintain and recover a healthy biodiversity, Australians must address the serious problems faced by their natural environment - habitat loss, inappropriate land management, change in fire regimes, pollution of natural resources, proliferation of invasive species and climate change. This comprehensive and practical guide to Queensland's threatened animals features up-to-date distribution data, photos and maps for most of Queensland's threatened animals. KEY FEATURES * Includes up-to-date distribution data, photos and maps * Includes a comprehensive list of resources, with key state, national and international organizations involved in the recovery of threatened species * Complemented by an open access website that will be updated on a regular basis
Download or read book Altered Ecologies written by Simon Haberle and published by ANU E Press. This book was released on 2010-11-01 with total page 525 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Like a star chart this volume orientates the reader to the key issues and debates in Pacific and Australasian biogeography, palaeoecology and human ecology. A feature of this collection is the diversity of approaches ranging from interpretation of the biogeographic significance of plant and animal distributional patterns, pollen analysis from peats and lake sediments to discern Quaternary climate change, explanation of the patterns of faunal extinction events, the interplay of fire on landscape evolution, and models of the environmental consequences of human settlement patterns. The diversity of approaches, geographic scope and academic rigor are a fitting tribute to the enormous contributions of Geoff Hope. As made apparent in this volume, Hope pioneered multidisciplinary understanding of the history and impacts of human cultures in the Australia- Pacific region, arguably the globe's premier model systems for understanding the consequences of humans colonization on ecological systems. The distinguished scholars who have contributed to this volume also demonstrate Hope's enduring contribution as an inspirational research leader, collaborator and mentor. Terra Australis leave no doubt that history matters, not only for land management, but more importantly, in alerting settler and indigenous societies alike to their past ecological impacts and future environmental trajectories.
Download or read book New Zealand Journal of Zoology written by and published by . This book was released on 1985 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Feathered Marvels written by Dominic F. Sherony and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2024-02-07 with total page 349 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the discovery of the fossil Archaeopteryx to more than 10,000 different documented species today, birds have become the second most diversified class of vertebrates on Earth. Birds have evolved extensively since they first emerged in prehistoric times--but that diversity could dwindle and even vanish unless we take steps to conserve their habitats, ensuring that they sustain their numbers and their variety. This natural history of birds starts in the distant past--going back to the Jurassic, Cretaceous and Paleogene periods--in order to get a broader understanding of the birds that we see today. Chapters cover their lives, breeding, flight, migration and more, while also highlighting some especially unique bird fossils, such as the Pelagornis Sandersi, which had a wingspan of more than 20 feet. Also included are chapters on the loss of needed habitats, the current decline of native birds, and what can be done to reverse it.
Download or read book How the Earthquake Bird Got Its Name and Other Tales of an Unbalanced Nature written by H.H. Shugart and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2008-10-01 with total page 239 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although people have been altering earth’s landscapes to some extent for tens of thousands of years, humankind today is causing massive changes to the planet. Such widespread environmental change is accompanied by accelerating rates of species extinction. In this book, noted ecologist H. H. Shugart presents important ecological concepts through entertaining animal parables. He tells the stories of particular birds and mammals—the packrat, ivory-billed woodpecker, penguin, dingo, European rabbit, and others—and what their fates reveal about the interactions between environmental change and the extinctions or explosions of species populations. Change is the root of many planetary problems, but it is also an intrinsic feature of our living planet. Shugart explores past environmental change, discusses the non-existence of a “balance of Nature,” and documents how human alterations have affected plants, soils, and animals. He looks with hope toward a future in which thoughtful people learn—and use—ecological science to protect the landscapes upon which terrestrial creatures depend.
Download or read book Australian Good Birding Guide Northern Territory written by Ted Wnorowski and published by Ted and Alex Wnorowski. This book was released on 2024-07-01 with total page 430 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the seventh book by Ted and Alex Wnorowski in the series of comprehensive travel guidebooks to birdwatching destinations in Australia. The Northern Territory guide describes interesting and reasonably accessible birding spots located in NT. Description of each birding site includes, at a minimum, habitat description, site facilities and key avifauna. The authors have cross-checked and supplemented their findings with verified sightings reported online. https://www.australian-good-birding-guide.com/ Other books by Ted & Alex Wnorowski: Australian Good Birdwatching Guide: NSW-ACT Australian Good Birdwatching Guide: Tasmania Australian Good Birdwatching Guide: Victoria Australian Good Birdwatching Guide: Southern Central Queensland Australian Good Birdwatching Guide: Northern Queensland Australian Good Birdwatching Guide: Northern Territory In preparation: Australian Good Birdwatching Guide: Western Australia
Download or read book Tropical Rain Forests written by Richard T. Corlett and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2011-03-03 with total page 485 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first edition of Tropical Rain Forests: an Ecological and Biogeographical Comparison exploded the myth of ‘the rain forest’ as a single, uniform entity. In reality, the major tropical rain forest regions, in tropical America, Africa, Southeast Asia, Madagascar, and New Guinea, have as many differences as similarities, as a result of their isolation from each other during the evolution of their floras and faunas. This new edition reinforces this message with new examples from recent and on-going research. After an introduction to the environments and geological histories of the major rain forest regions, subsequent chapters focus on plants, primates, carnivores and plant-eaters, birds, fruit bats and gliding animals, and insects, with an emphasis on the ecological and biogeographical differences between regions. This is followed by a new chapter on the unique tropical rain forests of oceanic islands. The final chapter, which has been completely rewritten, deals with the impacts of people on tropical rain forests and discusses possible conservation strategies that take into account the differences highlighted in the previous chapters. This exciting and very readable book, illustrated throughout with color photographs, will be invaluable reading for undergraduate students in a wide range of courses as well as an authoritative reference for graduate and professional ecologists, conservationists, and interested amateurs.
Download or read book The Bird Way written by Jennifer Ackerman and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2021-05-04 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the New York Times bestselling author of The Genius of Birds, a radical investigation into the bird way of being, and the recent scientific research that is dramatically shifting our understanding of birds -- how they live and how they think. “There is the mammal way and there is the bird way.” But the bird way is much more than a unique pattern of brain wiring, and lately, scientists have taken a new look at bird behaviors they have, for years, dismissed as anomalies or mysteries –– What they are finding is upending the traditional view of how birds conduct their lives, how they communicate, forage, court, breed, survive. They are also revealing the remarkable intelligence underlying these activities, abilities we once considered uniquely our own: deception, manipulation, cheating, kidnapping, infanticide, but also ingenious communication between species, cooperation, collaboration, altruism, culture, and play. Some of these extraordinary behaviors are biological conundrums that seem to push the edges of, well, birdness: a mother bird that kills her own infant sons, and another that selflessly tends to the young of other birds as if they were her own; a bird that collaborates in an extraordinary way with one species—ours—but parasitizes another in gruesome fashion; birds that give gifts and birds that steal; birds that dance or drum, that paint their creations or paint themselves; birds that build walls of sound to keep out intruders and birds that summon playmates with a special call—and may hold the secret to our own penchant for playfulness and the evolution of laughter. Drawing on personal observations, the latest science, and her bird-related travel around the world, from the tropical rainforests of eastern Australia and the remote woodlands of northern Japan, to the rolling hills of lower Austria and the islands of Alaska’s Kachemak Bay, Jennifer Ackerman shows there is clearly no single bird way of being. In every respect, in plumage, form, song, flight, lifestyle, niche, and behavior, birds vary. It is what we love about them. As E.O Wilson once said, when you have seen one bird, you have not seen them all.
Download or read book Australian Deserts written by Steve Morton and published by CSIRO PUBLISHING. This book was released on 2022-02 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Australian Deserts: Ecology and Landscapes is about the vast sweep of the Outback, a land of expanses making up three-quarters of the continent – the heart of Australia. Steve Morton brings his extensive first-hand knowledge and experience of arid Australia to this book, explaining how Australian deserts work ecologically. This book outlines why unpredictable rainfall and paucity of soil nutrients underpin the nature of desert ecosystems, while also describing how plants and animals came to be desert dwellers through evolutionary time. It shows how plants use uncertain rainfall to provide for persistence of their populations, alongside outlines of the dominant animals of the deserts and explanations of the features that help them succeed in the face of aridity and uncertainty. Richly illustrated with the photographs of Mike Gillam, this fascinating and accessible book will enhance your understanding of the nature of arid Australia.
Download or read book Birds Bats and Blooms written by Theodore H. Fleming and published by University of Arizona Press. This book was released on 2024-11-19 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Like gems flitting through the sky, hummingbirds attract our eye. But they are more than flash: they are critical pollinators in their ecosystems. Similarly in the darkness of night, nectar-feeding bats perform the same important ecological service as their colorful avian counterparts. Vertebrate pollinators like bats and birds are keystone species of the Sonoran Desert. Biologist Theodore H. Fleming uses these species—found in the desert around his home—to address two big questions dealing with the evolution of life on Earth: How did these animals evolve, and how did they coevolve with their food plants? A deeply thoughtful and researched dive into evolutionary history, Birds, Bats, and Blooms offers an engaging trip across evolutionary trajectories as it discusses nectar-feeding birds and bats and their coevolution as pollinators with flowering plants. The primary focus is on New World birds such as hummingbirds and their chiropteran counterparts (nectar-feeding bats in the family Phyllostomidae). It also discusses their Old World ecological counterparts, including sunbirds, honeyeaters, lorikeets, and nectar-feeding bats in the Pteropodidae family. Fleming also addresses the conservation status of these beautiful animals. Through engaging prose, Fleming pulls together the most recent research in evolutionary biology and pairs it with accounts of his personal interactions with bats and birds. His account includes fourteen color photographs taken by the author during his research trips around the world.
Download or read book Gardens for All Seasons written by Mary Horsfall and published by CSIRO PUBLISHING. This book was released on 2012 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Gardens for All Seasons is a gardening lifestyle book by bestselling author Mary Horsfall, celebrating the role of gardens in our lives and advising on the timing of jobs in the gardening year throughout Australia. Monthly chapters include topics such as planning, bushfire preparation, watering, pot plant care, mulching, weeding, fertilising, pruning, propagating, pest control, what to plant for different climate zones and what garden venues and events to visit. Mary details her own gardening year, including jobs done, fruits and vegetables harvested, food cooked based on the harvest, what was in flower and wildlife observations - all on a month by month basis. Each chapter includes a special topic of the month, such as fun for kids in the garden, biodiversity, manipulating microclimate, and fragrance and first aid.--
