The Mascarene islands in the southern Indian Ocean - Mauritius, R union
and Rodrigues - were once home to an extraordinary range of birds and
reptiles. Evolving on these isolated volcanic islands in the absence of
mammalian predators or competitors, the land was dominated by giant
tortoises, parrots, skinks and geckos, burrowing boas, flightless rails
herons, and of course (in Mauritius) the Dodo. Uninhabited and
only discovered in the 1500s, colonisation by European settlers in the
1600s led to dramatic changes in the ecology of the islands; the birds
and tortoises were slaughtered indiscriminately while introduced rats,
cats, pigs and monkeys destroyed their eggs, the once-extensive forests
logged, and invasive introduced plants from all over the tropics
devastated the ecosystem. The now-familiar icon of extinction, the
Dodo, was gone from Mauritius within 50 years of human settlement, and
over the next 150 years many of the Mascarenes' other native
vertebrates followed suit.
The
product of over 30 years research by Anthony Cheke, Lost Land of the
Dodo provides a comprehensive yet hugely enjoyable account of the story
of the islands' changing ecology, interspersed with human stories, the
islands' biogeographical anomalies, and much else. Many French
publications, old and new, especially for R union, are discussed and
referenced in English for the first time. The book is richly
illustrated with maps and contemporary illustrations of the animals and
their environment, many of which have rarely been reprinted before.
Illustrated box texts look in detail at each extinct vertebrate
species, while Julian Hume's superb colour plates bring many of the
extinct birds to life. Lost Land of the Dodo provides the definitive
account of this tragic yet remarkable fauna, and is a must-read for
anyone interested in islands, their ecology and the history of our
relationship with the world around us.
