Download or read book Sunbird written by Wilbur Smith and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2018-01-01 with total page 666 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An action-packed archaeological adventure from global bestseller Wilbur Smith “You should know of the legend. At a time when the rocks were soft and the air was misty, there was an abomination and an evil in this place which was put down by our ancestors. They placed a death curse upon these hills and commanded that this evil be cleaned from the earth and from the minds of men, forever.” A lost civilisation. A curse reborn. Dr Ben Kazin has only a blurred photograph and a gut instinct that there is a lost city to uncover somewhere beneath the Botswana cliffs. Soon, a whispered curse and a chance encounter with a local tribe lead him to discover much more than city foundations. The curse, it seems, is real, and will link Ben, his oldest friend, and the woman they both love with a forgotten leader from two thousand years ago, in a city of glory and honour that subsequently disappeared without a trace. But what happened to that ancient civilisation? And what is it that connects that lost empire to Ben, and the violent dangers he must face in the present day?
Download or read book Avian Flight written by John J. Videler and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2006-08-10 with total page 319 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bird flight has always intrigued mankind. This book provides an up to date account of our existing knowledge on the subject, as well as offering new insights and challenging some established views. A brief history of the science of flight introduces the basic physical principles governing aerial locomotion. A treatment of flight-related functional morphology concentrates on the difference in shape of the arm and hand part of the wings, on the structure and function of tails, and on the shape of the body. The anatomy and mechanical properties of feathers receive special attention. Aerodynamic principles used by birds are explained in theory by simply applying Newton's laws, and in practice by showing the direction and velocity of the attached flow around an arm wing cross section and of the leading edge vortex flow above a hand wing. The Archaeopteryx fossils remain crucial in our understanding of the evolution of bird flight despite the recent discovery of a range of well-preserved ancient birds. A novel insight into the interactions between wings and air challenges established theories relating to the origin of bird flight. Take-off, flapping flight, gliding and landing are the basic ingredients of bird flight, and birds use a variety of flight styles from hovering to soaring. Flight muscles consisting of mosaics of specialised fibres are the engines that generate the force required to keep the wings and tail in the gliding configuration and perform work during flapping motion. The energy required to fly can be estimated or measured directly, and a comparison of the empirical results provides insights into the trend in metabolic costs of flight of birds varying in shape and mass from hummingbirds to albatrosses.
Download or read book The Last Flight of the Scarlet Macaw written by Bruce Barcott and published by Random House. This book was released on 2009-01-13 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “The first time we came here I didn’t know what to expect,” she told me as we paddled upstream. “What we found just blew me away. Jaguars, pumas, river otters, howler monkeys. The place was like a Noah’s Ark for all the endangered species driven out of the rest of Central America. There was so much life! That expedition was when I first saw the macaws.” As a young woman, Sharon Matola lived many lives. She was a mushroom expert, an Air Force survival specialist, and an Iowa housewife. She hopped freight trains for fun and starred as a tiger tamer in a traveling Mexican circus. Finally she found her one true calling: caring for orphaned animals at her own zoo in the Central American country of Belize. Beloved as “the Zoo Lady” in her adopted land, Matola became one of Central America’s greatest wildlife defenders. And when powerful outside forces conspired with the local government to build a dam that would flood the nesting ground of the last scarlet macaws in Belize, Sharon Matola was drawn into the fight of her life. In The Last Flight of the Scarlet Macaw, award-winning author Bruce Barcott chronicles Sharon Matola’s inspiring crusade to stop a multinational corporation in its tracks. Ferocious in her passion, she and her confederates–a ragtag army of courageous locals and eccentric expatriates–endure slander and reprisals and take the fight to the courtroom and the boardroom, from local village streets to protests around the world. As the dramatic story unfolds, Barcott addresses the realities of economic survival in Third World countries, explores the tension between environmental conservation and human development, and puts a human face on the battle over globalization. In this marvelous and spirited book, Barcott shows us how one unwavering woman risked her life to save the most beautiful bird in the world. "Barcott’s compelling narrative is suspenseful right up to the last moment." –Publisher's Weekly "An engrossing but sad account of a brave and quirky champion of nature."–Kirkus “…A riveting account of one woman’s fight to save one of the last bastions of an endangered Species. . . Barcott writes of international politics, ecology and endangered species, and human relations with equal facility. This real page-turner of narrative nonfiction is hard to put down.” –Booklist
Download or read book Sunbirds written by Clive F. Mann and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2010-07-30 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sunbirds is the first book since the 19th Century to cover in detail all the world's sunbirds and spiderhunters - the Nectarinidae. It also includes the allied families of flowerpeckers and sugarbirds; a total of 176 species is described and illustrated. The book has been designed to help readers identify all of these species and also their various subspecies, the most distinctive of which are illustrated as well as described. Each species account provides a distribution map, a summary of identification criteria and a description of how the species differs from similar ones. The calls and songs, habitat, geographical distribution, status, movements, food (including a list of known food plants), habits, and breeding biology are also described. Finally, a full description of the species and salient features of each subspecies is given, together with measurements and references. Sunbirds not only aids identification, it provides a wealth of information on the ecology and behaviour of these birds. The authors have carried out extensive fieldwork in Asia and Africa. They have also studied skins, nests and eggs held by museums, analysed tape recordings and critically reviewed the vast amount of material contained in books and scientific journals. The superb plates would not have been possible without the exhaustive study of specimens which, together with the use of photographs of living birds, has resulted in the artist, Richard Allen, capturing the essence of the birds, their 'jizz', and accurately portraying the beautiful, bright, often iridescent, plumages of these spectacular families.
Download or read book NASA Tech Briefs written by and published by . This book was released on 1987 with total page 116 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Flight of Birds written by Lobb, Joshua and published by Sydney University Press. This book was released on 2019-02-01 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Shortlisted for the Readings Prize for New Australian Fiction in 2019! The Flight of Birds is a novel in twelve stories, each of them compelled by an encounter between the human and animal worlds. The birds in these stories inhabit the same space as humans, but they are also apart, gliding above us. The Flight of Birds: A Novel in Twelve Stories explores what happens when the two worlds meet. Joshua Lobb’s stories are at once intimate and expansive, grounded in an exquisite sense of place. The birds in these stories are variously free and wild, native and exotic, friendly and hostile. Humans see some of them as pets, some of them as pests, and some of them as food. Through a series of encounters between birds and humans, the book unfolds as a meditation on grief and loss, isolation and depression, and the momentary connections that sustain us through them. Underpinning these interactions is an awareness of climate change, of the violence we do to the living beings around us, and of the possibility of transformation. The Flight of Birds will change how you think about the planet and humanity’s place in it.
Download or read book Flow Phenomena in Nature A challenge to engineering design written by Roland Liebe and published by WIT Press. This book was released on 2007 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Do we have an adequate understanding of fluid dynamics phenomena in nature and evolution, and what physical models do we need? What can we learn from nature to stimulate innovations in thinking as well as in engineering applications? Concentrating on flight and propulsion, this unique and accessible book compares fluid dynamics solutions in nature with those in engineering. The respected international contributors present up-to-date research in an easy to understand manner, giving common viewpoints from fields such as zoology, engineering, biology, fluid mechanics and physics. Contents: Introduction to Fluid Dynamics; Swimming and Flying in Nature; Generation of Forces in Fluids - Current Understanding; The Finite, Natural Vortex in Steady and Unsteady Fluid Dynamics - New Modelling; Applications in Engineering with Inspirations From Nature; Modern Experimental and Numerical Methods in Fluid Dynamics.
Download or read book Ornithology written by Frank B. Gill and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 1995 with total page 802 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Approaches the subject from a biological and evolutionary perspective rather than just identification.
Download or read book Objective Zoology written by and published by Krishna Prakashan Media. This book was released on with total page 1496 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Birds of Africa Volume VIII written by Roger Safford and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2020-09-17 with total page 1025 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Universally recognised as by far the most authoritative work ever published on the subject, The Birds of Africa is a superb multi-contributor reference work, with encyclopaedic species texts, stunning paintings of all species and numerous subspecies, informative line drawings, detailed range maps, and extensive bibliographies. Each volume contains an Introduction that brings the reader up to date with the latest developments in African ornithology, including the evolution and biogeography of African birds. Diagnoses of the families and genera, often with superspecies maps, are followed by the comprehensive species accounts themselves. These include descriptions of range and status, field characters, voice, general habits, food, and breeding habits. Full bibliographies, acoustic references, and indexes complete this scholarly work of reference. This eighth and final volume covers the Malagasy region which comprises Madagascar and the various islands and archipelagos of the Indian Ocean including the Seychelles, the Comoros, Mauritius and Réunion. Every resident and migrant species is covered in full detail, comparable to other volumes in the series, and with a colour map for each species. Vagrants are treated in less detail. All species are illustrated on a beautiful series of 64 colour plates, with original artwork from John Gale and Brian Small. This is a major work of reference on the birds of the region and will remain the standard text for many years to come.
Download or read book Ayurvedic Yoga Therapy written by Mukunda Stiles and published by Lotus Press. This book was released on 2008-05 with total page 282 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Yoga.
Download or read book Toucans Barbets and Honeyguides written by Lester Short and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2001-11-08 with total page 644 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book covers in unmatched detail the life history, relationships, biology, and conservation of all the world's toucans, barbets, and honeyguides. These number 133 species, found in tropical regions around the world. The toucans are especially well-known because of their dramatic bills and their association with the Amazon rainforest. The colour plates, painted by well- known US artist Albert Earl Gilbert, are probably the best paintings of these birds ever produced.
Download or read book Flight International written by and published by . This book was released on 1987 with total page 948 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Birds of Africa Volume VI written by and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2020-06-25 with total page 788 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Universally recognised as by far the most authoritative work ever published on the subject, The Birds of Africa is a superb multi-contributor reference work, with encyclopaedic species texts, stunning paintings of all species and numerous subspecies, hundreds of informative line drawings, detailed range maps, and extensive bibliographies. Each volume contains an Introduction that brings the reader up to date with the latest developments in African ornithology, including the evolution and biogeography of African birds. Diagnoses of the families and genera, often with superspecies maps, are followed by the comprehensive species accounts themselves. These include descriptions of range and status, field characters, voice, general habits, food, and breeding habits. Full bibliographies, acoustic references, and indexes complete this scholarly work of reference. This sixth volume in the series deals comprehensively with picathartes, babblers, long-tailed tits, tits, penduline tits, nuthatches, creepers, sunbirds, white-eyes, sugarbirds, true shrikes, bush-shrikes, bulbuls, helmet-shrikes, orioles, drongos, crows, starlings and oxpeckers. The editors and artists have worked closely with other authors - all acknowledged experts in their field - to produce a superb reference in which comprehensive texts on every species are complemented by accurate and detailed paintings and drawings of the birds themselves.
Download or read book The Sunbird written by Elizabeth Wein and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2013-12-17 with total page 254 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: DIVDIVA deadly plague rages through Aksum, and only one boy can uncover the traitor who spreads the disease and threatens to destroy the kingdom/divDIV Telemakos, a descendant of both British and Aksumite rulers, has always been an outcast, but his resolve, loyalty, and bravery have never failed his royal heritage. When a plague spreads through the kingdom of Aksum, his aunt Goewin, British ambassador to Aksum, calls upon Telemakos to travel to the Afar desert and discover who has been a traitor to the crown, spreading the plague through the shipment of salt from port to port./divDIV Traveling in disguise as a deaf-mute slave, Telemakos is captured and subjected to cruelty and suffering. Now more than ever, he must call on his extraordinary courage and his gift for silence—for if he fails, it will cost him his life./divDIV This ebook features an illustrated biography of Elizabeth Wein including rare images from the author’s personal collection./divDIV/div/div
Download or read book Birds of Kruger National Park written by Keith Barnes and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2017-06-27 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: South Africa's Kruger National Park is one of the largest and most iconic conservation areas in Africa. Habitats range from wide-open savannah and rugged thornveld to broadleaved mopani woodland. This microhabitat variation gives Kruger a phenomenal diversity of some 520 bird species, half of which are resident. From Africa's most extraordinary eagles, like the scarlet-faced Bateleur, to electric-colored glossy-starlings and jewel-like finches, Kruger offers an avian celebration of form and color. It is also a crucial conservation area, supporting South Africa's largest viable populations of vultures, eagles, and large terrestrial birds. This field guide offers a unique window into the world of Kruger's birds. More than 500 stunning color photographs illustrate the 259 most frequently encountered species, and a habitat-based approach assists in identification. The authoritative text provides key information about identification, habitat, behavior, biology, and conservation. The guide contains information likely to be new to even the most experienced birders, but is written in a nontechnical style that makes it accessible to anyone. An essential guide to Kruger's birds Perfect for new and experienced birders alike Small, portable format ideal for field use Unique attractive layout with more than 500 stunning color photographs Covers the 259 most frequently seen species Uses a habitat-based approach to aid identification Authoritative and accessible text provides key information about identification, behavior, biology, and conservation Distributed by Princeton University Press
Download or read book Bird Notes written by and published by . This book was released on 1917 with total page 508 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: