A group of special interest to mammalogists, taxonomists, and systemicists, ungulates have proven difficult to classify. This comprehensive review of the taxonomic relationships of artiodactyls and perissodactyls brings forth new evidence in order to propose a theory of ungulate taxonomy.With this straightforward volume, Colin Groves and the late Peter Grubb cut through previous assumptions to define ungulate genera, species, and subspecies. The species-by-species accounts incorpor...

The Encyclopedia of North American Mammals describes and illustrates over 500 mammals, from the bear and bat to whale and deer. With over 2,000 color photographs, this encyclopedia is for every reader from the novice to the experienced observer.FEATURES:- Information about each North American Mammal. - Over 2,000 color photographs. - Intuitive navigation: navigate from Table of Contents or search for words or phrases. - The Encyclopedia is stored in your local memory - you get the informat...

The New York Times–bestselling "exploration of the world from a piscine perspective . . . makes a persuasive case that what fish know is quite a lot" (Elizabeth Kolbert, The New York Review of Books).Do fishes think? Do they really have three-second memories? And can they recognize the humans who peer back at them from above the surface of the water? In What a Fish Knows, ethologist Jonathan Balcombe addresses these questions and more, revealing th...

Cichlid fishes are amazing creatures. In terms of sheer number of species, they are the most successful of all families of vertebrate animals, and the extent and speed with which they have evolved in some African lakes has made them the darlings of evolutionary biologists. But what truly captivates biologists like George Barlow -- not to mention thousands of aquarists the world over -- is the complexity of their social lives and their devotion to family (most species of cichlids are monoga...

Everybody Out of the PondAt the Water's Edge will change the way you think about your place in the world. The awesome journey of life's transformation from the first microbes 4 billion years ago to Homo sapiens today is an epic that we are only now beginning to grasp. Magnificent and bizarre, it is the story of how we got here, what we left behind, and what we brought with us.We all know about evolution, but it still seems absurd that our an...

Originally published in 1962, and fully updated and colorized by Scott Shupe, Poisonous Snakes of the World is the perfect practical guide to not only snake bite survival, but to understand and identifying every venomous snake on the planet. Even if no life hangs in the balance, this manual is a great reference guide for the outdoors enthusiast, the reptile lover, or anyone with a thirst for pragmatic, how-to knowledge.With this comprehensive edition, you will be armed wit...

Pipits and Wagtails is the first comprehensive guide to all the species and subspecies that occur in Europe, Asia, North Africa and North America.The detailed species accounts cover all aspects of identification (size, structure, plumage, bare parts, geographical variation, behaviour, distribution, and habitat.) In particular, great care has been taken to illustrate and describe accurately the differences between all valid subspecies as well as differences relating...

Widespread in North American forest regions including the Rocky Mountains, the Boreal Owl (Aegolius funereus) was once the most numerous predatory bird in Eurasian boreal forests. Synthesising the results of unique long-term studies of Boreal Owls, this book explores hunting modes, habitats and foods, prey interactions, mating and parental care, reproduction, dispersal, survival and mortality, population regulation and conservation in boreal forests. Providing a detailed introduction to th...

An authoritative study of extinction in birds, with case studies of 20 critically endangered species and the research initiatives designed to save them.Almost two hundred species of birds have become extinct in the past 400 years, and a similar number today are in imminent danger of following them. The world's conservationists are leading the fight to prevent the demise of these remaining critically endangered birds, with a fair degree of success.This new b...

The definitive guide to the bats of Britain and Europe.This concise and definitive guide presents all 45 bat species that regularly occur in Europe (of which 17 are known to breed in the British Isles). The extensive introduction details the remarkable biology of bats and explores the latest findings in bat evolution, behaviour and echolocation.This is followed by in-depth species accounts covering life history, conservation status and identification of fam...

Hippos are unusual in being genuinely amphibious. This has a fundamental effect on their physiology and way of life.Following a general introduction, there is a detailed description of hippo anatomy and physiology, including facts about their skin structure and physiology.Subsequent chapters are devoted to their social biology and ecology, including descriptions of their breeding and feeding ecology. Several extraordinary instances of carnivory, including a...

No other human-caused extinction event has been as spectacular and as pervasive in the literature as that of the passenger pigeon (Ectopistes migratorius). However, documentation of this event relies on personal journals, newspaper and magazine articles, and a few volumes that summarize some of the events after the passenger pigeons were extinct. The prevalent message from most of the articles is that passenger pigeons, once the most abundant bird on the planet, went extinct because humans...