Book reviews
Discover more about the cornucopia of creatures that share your abode.
Household wildlife, barn owls and rainforests
HOUSE PESTS, HOUSE GUESTS
By Richard Jones
Bloomsbury £16.99 (out 12 February 2015)
However much we love wildlife, we are selective about the species we welcome into our flats and houses. But this doesn’t stop animals inviting themselves. In the interests of understanding if not tolerance Richard Jones, an entomologist who is a regular contributor to BBC Wildlife (see p107), provides an intriguing introduction to these companion species and their motivation for sharing what he calls the sacred space of our homes.
The book begins with a historical tour, describing how our adoption of homes, clothes and larders created new habitats, then focuses on the many species to exploit them, from mice to moths, bats to beetles, swallows to spiders, and devoted dogs to “just about the most embarrassing insect in the world” – the crab louse.
The writing is a kind of amiable but authoritative boffin-speak. Not too technical – in fact it’s exceptionally readable – but imbued with a powerful sense that ‘Bugman Jones’ (his Twitter moniker) is a man who’d discuss tapeworms enthusiastically at dinner, and regard an eruption of cat fleas from the carpet with nothing so much as glee.
Amy-Jane Beer Natural-history writer
FUTURE ARCTIC
By Edward Struzik
Island Press £16.99 (out 3 February 2015)
The Arctic, as we know well, is sick. The key symptoms are familiar: plunging polar bear numbers and receding summer sea-ice that could be gone entirely within 20 years. The veteran environmental journalist Edward Struzik has monitored other vital signs over recent decades: fluctuations in caribou populations; unusual movements of salmon, narwhals and belugas; altered river flows; freak weather; and catastrophic fires. Climate, he observes, isn’t the only culprit – exploitation by mining and energy industries also fragments and damages habitats. The scope and detail of his diagnosis lend weight to an alarming prognosis.
Paul Bloomfield Travel writer
FOX and BARN OWL
By Jim Crumley
Saraband £10.00 each
‘Concise’ isn’t a word often used to describe nature writing, yet Jim Crumley’s first two books in the Encounters in the Wild series are just that. Each pocket-sized title explores the author’s personal encounters with one of Britain’s charismatic creatures, from tracking freshly woken foxes through the snow to reviving and releasing injured barn owls. By turns eloquent, light-hearted, prescient and moving, Crumley’s anecdotes highlight the wonderful feelings he associates with waiting for the emergence of magical experiences with nature. With more books to come, this series is an accessible addition to the nature-writing scene.
Jules Howard Nature writer
IRREPLACEABLE WOODLANDS
By Charles Flower
Papadikis £25.00
Woodland manager Charles Flower explains the practical steps needed to restore the wildlife heritage of ancient woodland in this beautifully illustrated followup to Where Have All The Flowers Gone?? The author records 30 years of biodiversity-promoting management in Mapleash Copse, Newbury, a 25-acre (10ha) ancient woodland where bramble-bashing, deer depredation, vast fungal diversity, butterfly-rich rides and log-loving beetles form a maintenance microstudy. Flower inspires us to preserve our ancient woodlands, because their intertwined natural and human histories make them unique.
Adrian Barnett Ecologist and writer
THE BOOK OF BEETLES
By Patrice Bouchard (ed)
Ivy Press £29.99
The beetles in this book, as well as being pictured life-size, are of course shown magnified, and this is where they are revealed as gems. And though 600 species is a pinch compared with the almost unimaginable diversity of beetles, the selected examples illustrate well the available delights – from predators in the leaf litter and shovellers of dung to woodborers, pollen-nibblers, leaf-chewers, carcass cleaners, ant guests and beaver parasites. It’s this broad cross-section of behaviours and ecologies that provides us with the scientific detail. A coffee-table look and monographic gravitas combined in a book the size of a breeze block – what’s not to like?
Richard Jones Entomologist