Dimensions
140 x 211 x 29mm
From the acclaimed scientist and writer, essays collected for the first time in book form, on ravens and other birds, insects, trees, elephants, and more, bring "passionate observations (that) superbly mix memoir and science" (New York Times). From one of the finest scientist/writers of our time comes an engaging record of a life spent in close observation of the natural world, one that has yielded "marvelous, mind-altering" (Los Angeles Times) insight and discoveries. In essays that span several decades, Heinrich finds himself at his beloved camp in Maine; plays host to annoying visitors from Europe (the cluster fly) and more helpful guests from Asia (ladybugs); and unravels the far-reaching ecological consequences of elephants in Botswana bruising mopane trees. Heinrich then turns to his great love, the extraordinary behaviours of ravens; chronicles a magical sighting of hundreds of loons congregated on a lake in Maine, something never recorded before; and observes that the human species has biological roots as endurance runners: "We were all runners once." Finally, he asks "Where does a biologist find hope?" In Naturalist at Large, Bernd Heinrich delivers an answer.
