With its colorful landscape and wonderful diversity of plant and animal communities, the southwestern borderlands have attracted naturalists for centuries. As Col. Thomas Henry noted in 1853, there “are to be found many curious birds, peculiar to the country.” This book identifies more than 100 early ornithologists and explorers who entered the Southwest from 1528 to 1900, all of whom have contributed in significant ways to our understanding of the region’s avian life. Dan Fischer identifies those individuals who documented the natural history of the Southwest and summarizes their contributions to our knowledge about the region’s birds—particularly through discovering and naming them. He tells why the ornithologists came to the region, what they saw, who described and named the new discoveries, and who were the first to sketch or paint new birds. Beginning with accounts of the earliest Spanish explorers such as Cabeza de Vaca and Coronado, Fischer considers all who visited the region through the end of the nineteenth century, including such renowned naturalists as William Gambel, John McCown, Adolphus Heermann, Elliott Coues, Charles Bendire, and Henry Henshaw. In between, he recalls English mining speculators, French traders, army explorers, railroad surveyors, and more—all of whom contributed to ornithological knowledge. Although focusing on ornithologists, Fischer’s text reveals the wonderful variety of avian species in the region and their relationship with human history. Featuring a comprehensive bibliography, illustrations, and maps that portray the westward march of exploration, it is a major sourcebook for southwestern ornithology and an essential volume for anyone interested in birds.

"Dan Fischer identifies those individuals who documented the natural history of the Southwest and summarizes their contributions to our knowledge about the region's birds - particularly through discovering and naming them. He tells why the ornithologists came to the region, what they saw, who described and named the new discoveries, and who were the first to sketch or paint new birds."--BOOK JACKET.

This book explores the life of Henry Dresser (1838–1915), one of the most productive British ornithologists of the mid-late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and is largely based on previously unpublished archival material. Dresser travelled widely and spent time in Texas during the American Civil War. He built enormous collections of skins and eggs of birds from Europe, North America and Asia, which formed the basis of over 100 publications, including some of the finest bird books of the late nineteenth century. Dresser was a leading figure in scientific society and in the early bird conservation movement; his correspondence and diaries reveal the inner workings, motivations, personal relationships and rivalries that existed among the leading ornithologists.

Designed to help birders and banders identify, age, and sex all seventeen species of hummingbirds found in North America, this is the only identification guide devoted entirely to hummingbirds that includes up-close, easy-to-use illustrations. It also provides information on the eight species that have been reported but rarely seen in North America. On first viewing hummingbirds are often a blur of fast-moving color. However, when they perch and hover they can be observed, and the size, shape, and color; the proportions of the body, bill, throat, and tail; the wing feather pattern; and the birds’ behavior are crucial to accurate identification. The author’s concise descriptions and illustrations pinpoint all these features in clear, jargon-free language. Anyone who loves hummingbirds will welcome the information he provides.

This beautifully illustrated and user-friendly book presents the most up-to-date information available about the natural histories of birds of the Sierra Nevada, the origins of their names, the habitats they prefer, how they communicate and interact with one another, their relative abundance, and where they occur within the region. Each species account features original illustrations by Keith Hansen. In addition to characterizing individual species, Birds of the Sierra Nevada also describes ecological zones and bird habitats, recent trends in populations and ranges, conservation efforts, and more than 160 rare species. It also includes a glossary of terms, detailed maps, and an extensive bibliography with over 500 citations.

Ecology is the centerpiece of many of the most important decisions that face humanity. Roots of Ecology documents the deep ancestry of this now enormously important science from the early ideas of Herodotos, Plato, and Pliny, up through those of Linnaeus and Darwin, to those that inspired Ernst Haeckel's mid-nineteenth-century neologism ecology. Based on a long-running series of regularly published columns, this important work gathers a vast literature illustrating the development of ecological and environmental concepts, ideas, and creative thought that has led to our modern view of ecology. Roots of Ecology should be on every ecologist's shelf.

"Samuel W. Woodhouse, physician and naturalist with the 1851 Sitgreaves expedition to explore the southwestern territories won in the war with Mexico, kept a journal of the expedition from San Antonio to San Diego, describing the people, topography, plants, and animals encountered. This is the first publication of his account"--Provided by publisher.

This book offers an artistic depiction of O’odham lifeways through the paintings of internationally acclaimed O’odham artist Michael Chiago Sr. Ethnobiologist Amadeo M. Rea collaborated with the artist to describe the paintings in accompanying text, making this unique book a vital resource for cultural understanding and preservation. A joint effort in seeing, this work explores how the artist sees and interprets his culture through his art. A wide array of Chiago’s paintings are represented in this book, illustrating past and present Akimel O’odham and Tohono O’odham culture. The paintings show the lives and traditions of O’odham people from both the artist’s parents’ and grandparents’ generations and today. The paintings demonstrate the colonial Spanish, Mexican, and Anglo-American influences on O’odham culture throughout the decades, and the text explains how wells and windmills, schools, border walls, and nonnative crops have brought about significant change in O’odham life. The paintings and text in this book beautifully depict a variety of O’odham lifeways, including the striking Sonoran Desert environment of O’odham country, gathering local foods and cooking meals, shrines, ceremonies, dances, and more. By combining Chiago’s paintings of his lived experiences with Rea’s ethnographic work, this book offers a full, colorful, and powerful picture of O’odham heritage, culture, and language, creating a teaching reference for future generations.

Ethnobiology holds a special place in the hearts and minds of many because of its dedication to celebrating the knowledge and values of some of the most distinctive cultural practices in some of the most distinctive places on Earth. Yet we live in a world of diminishing natural and linguistic diversity. Whether due to climate change or capitalism, homogeneity is trumping the once-resplendent heterogeneity all around us. In this important new collection, Gary Paul Nabhan puts forth a call for the future not only of ethnobiology but for the entire planet. He articulates and broadens the portfolio of ethnobiological principles and amplifies the tool kit for anyone engaged in the ethnobiosphere, those vital spaces of intense interaction among cultures, habitats, and creatures. The essays are grouped into a trio of themes. The first group presents the big questions facing humanity, the second profiles tools and methodologies that may help to answer those questions, and the third ponders how to best communicate these issues not merely to other scholars, but to society at large. The essays attest to the ways humans establish and circumscribe their identities not only through their thoughts and actions, but also with their physical, emotional, and spiritual attachments to place, flora, fauna, fungi, and feasts. Nabhan and his colleagues from across disciplines and cultures encourage us to be courageous enough to include ethical, moral, and even spiritual dimensions in work regarding the fate of biocultural diversity. The essays serve as cairns on the critical path toward an ethnobiology that is provocative, problem-driven, and, above all, inspiring.

The saguaro, with its great size and characteristic shape—its arms stretching heavenward, its silhouette often resembling a human—has become the emblem of the Sonoran Desert of southwestern Arizona and northwestern Mexico. The largest and tallest cactus in the United States, it is both familiar and an object of fascination and curiosity. This book offers a complete natural history of this enduring and iconic desert plant. Gathering everything from the saguaro’s role in Sonoran Desert ecology to its adaptations to the desert climate and its sacred place in Indigenous culture, this book shares precolonial through current scientific findings. The saguaro is charismatic and readily accessible but also decidedly different from other desert flora. The essays in this book bear witness to our ongoing fascination with the great cactus and the plant’s unusual characteristics, covering the saguaro’s: history of discovery, place in the cactus family, ecology, anatomy and physiology, genetics, and ethnobotany. The Saguaro Cactus offers testimony to the cactus’s prominence as a symbol, the perceptions it inspires, its role in human society, and its importance in desert ecology.