Master storyteller Jakob Streit has spent much time in quiet communion with nature. In this wonderful collection of stories, he shares some of the conversations he has 'overheard' between different animals.Bright rhyming verse brings the unique characteristics of the different animals to life. Some unexpected conversations -- for example, a squirrel and a toad -- throw up delightful and unexpected outcomes. Funny and engaging, this book introduces children aged six and up to various animals, exploring what makes them both different and special. Includes several well-known animal fables.

Discusses how animals are capable of interacting intelligently through vocal and physical methods, drawing on work with prairie dogs to present evidence of animal communication methods and how they can be imitated by human researchers.

“You are about to enter a new genre, that of scientific fables, by which I don’t mean science fiction, or false stories about science, but, on the contrary, true ways of understanding how difficult it is to figure out what animals are up to.” —Bruno Latour, form the Foreword Is it all right to urinate in front of animals? What does it mean when a monkey throws its feces at you? Do apes really know how to ape? Do animals form same-sex relations? Are they the new celebrities of the twenty-first century? This book poses twenty-six such questions that stretch our preconceived ideas about what animals do, what they think about, and what they want. In a delightful abecedarium of twenty-six chapters, Vinciane Despret argues that behaviors we identify as separating humans from animals do not actually properly belong to humans. She does so by exploring incredible and often funny adventures about animals and their involvements with researchers, farmers, zookeepers, handlers, and other human beings. Do animals have a sense of humor? In reading these stories it is evident that they do seem to take perverse pleasure in creating scenarios that unsettle even the greatest of experts, who in turn devise newer and riskier hypotheses that invariably lead them to conclude that animals are not nearly as dumb as previously thought. These deftly translated accounts oblige us, along the way, to engage in both ethology and philosophy. Combining serious scholarship with humor that will resonate with anyone, this book—with a foreword by noted French philosopher, anthropologist, and sociologist of science Bruno Latour—is a must not only for specialists but also for general readers, including dog owners, who will never look at their canine companions the same way again.

Animals are a very special part of our world .... there are so many to love and admire What do they say to you? Explore our natural world and discover what the animals can teach us about health, love and listening to our spirit. Listen closely and you will hear the special messages meant just for you.

A comprehensive examination of a hotly debated question proposes a new model for mindreading in animals and a new experimental approach. Animals live in a world of other minds, human and nonhuman, and their well-being and survival often depends on what is going on in the minds of these other creatures. But do animals know that other creatures have minds? And how would we know if they do? In Mindreading Animals, Robert Lurz offers a fresh approach to the hotly debated question of mental-state attribution in nonhuman animals. Some empirical researchers and philosophers claim that some animals are capable of anticipating other creatures' behaviors by interpreting observable cues as signs of underlying mental states; others claim that animals are merely clever behavior-readers, capable of using such cues to anticipate others' behaviors without interpreting them as evidence of underlying mental states. Lurz argues that neither position is compelling and proposes a way to move the debate, and the field, forward. Lurz offers a bottom-up model of mental-state attribution that is built on cognitive abilities that animals are known to possess rather than on a preconceived view of the mind applicable to mindreading abilities in humans. Lurz goes on to describe an innovative series of new experimental protocols for animal mindreading research that show in detail how various types of animals—from apes to monkeys to ravens to dogs—can be tested for perceptual state and belief attribution.

Hailed conservationist Carl Safina examines animal personhood as told through the inspired narrative portraits of elephants, wolves, and dolphins

In this powerful follow-up to her groundbreaking book, Learning Their Language, Marta Williams presents fascinating stories that explore the connections among humans, nature, and animals and demonstrates the effective and life-enhancing techniques of intuitive communication.

Learn to communicate with your dog—using their language “Good reading for dog lovers and an immensely useful manual for dog owners.”—The Washington Post An Applied Animal Behaviorist and dog trainer with more than twenty years’ experience, Dr. Patricia McConnell reveals a revolutionary new perspective on our relationship with dogs—sharing insights on how “man’s best friend” might interpret our behavior, as well as essential advice on how to interact with our four-legged friends in ways that bring out the best in them. After all, humans and dogs are two entirely different species, each shaped by its individual evolutionary heritage. Quite simply, humans are primates and dogs are canids (as are wolves, coyotes, and foxes). Since we each speak a different native tongue, a lot gets lost in the translation. This marvelous guide demonstrates how even the slightest changes in our voices and in the ways we stand can help dogs understand what we want. Inside you will discover: • How you can get your dog to come when called by acting less like a primate and more like a dog • Why the advice to “get dominance” over your dog can cause problems • Why “rough and tumble primate play” can lead to trouble—and how to play with your dog in ways that are fun and keep him out of mischief • How dogs and humans share personality types—and why most dogs want to live with benevolent leaders rather than “alpha wanna-bes!” Fascinating, insightful, and compelling, The Other End of the Leash is a book that strives to help you connect with your dog in a completely new way—so as to enrich that most rewarding of relationships.

Nothing turns a baby's head more quickly than the sight or sound of an animal. This fascination is driven by the ancient chemical forces that first drew humans and animals together. It is also the same biology that transformed wolves into dogs and skittish horses into valiant comrades that would carry us into battle. Made for Each Other is the first book to explain how this chemistry of attraction and attachment flows through--and between--all mammals to create the profound emotional bonds humans and animals still feel today. Drawing on recent discoveries from neuroscience, evolutionary biology, behavioral psychology, archeology, as well as her own investigations, Meg Daley Olmert explains why the brain chemistry humans and animals trigger in each other also has a profound effect on our mental and physical well being. This lively and original investigation asks what happens when the bond is severed. If thousands of years of caring for animals infused us with a biology that shaped our hearts and minds, do we dare turn our back on it? Daley Olmert makes a compelling and scientific case for what our hearts have always known, that we were, and always will be, made for each other.