Experience the soothing power of adult coloring with these intricate animal tangles created by New York Times bestselling illustrator and master of the abstract Zen style Angela Porter! Zentangle is a fun and relaxing art form that has emerged in the last decade. Its free-form style, abstract images, and repetitive patterns all unite to create elaborate and soothing illustrations. This method has been said to increase mindfulness and aid in relaxation while simultaneously expressing creativity an ideal remedy for stress. Animals and nature are believed to have similar antistress properties. Combining this idea with the Zen style, bestselling illustrator Angela Porter takes you on a relaxing journey through the wilderness in this breathtaking collection that will help you de-stress and decompress. Featured are forty-nine beautiful designs for you to color and decorate each weaving together intricate swirling patterns and other geometric shapes to form some of your favorite members of the animal kingdom. As an added bonus, the pages are perforated and printed on one side, making it simple for you to remove and display your finished masterpieces. Instead of wasting your time with generic designs, color on the wild side with Angela Porter's Zen Doodle Animal Tangles. Whether you love cats, dogs, fish, birds, or even bears, this coloring book has them all. It's great for animal lovers and colorists alike!

Species evolve over time to become perfectly adapted to their environments, right?Well, sometimes. Consider that an elephant will not grow a seventh set of teeth, even though wearing down the sixth will condemn it to starvation; that hosts of the European cuckoo seem unable to tell that the overgrown monster in their nest is not their own chick; and that whales are fully aquatic mammals who, millions of years after first abandoning the land, still cannot breathe underwater. This book is about evolution, but not its greatest hits. Instead, it explores everything in the animal kingdom that is self-defeating, ill-made, uneconomical, or downright weird – and explains how natural selection has favoured it. In the grand struggle for survival, some surprising patterns emerge: animals are always slightly out-of-date; inefficiency tends to increase over time; predators usually lose, and parasites usually win. With equal parts humour and scientific insight, Andy Dobson is here to explain the how and why of evolution’s limits and liabilities.

Winner of the Marsh Book of the Year Award (2015) Throughout British history rivers have been of profound economic, social and cultural importance - yet as we see with increasing frequency they have the potential to wreak great destruction. This book describes the natural and not-so-natural changes that have affected British rivers since the last ice age and looks at the many plants and animals that live along, above and within them. Detailed case studies of the Meon, Dee and Endrick illustrate the incredibly varied nature of our river ecosystems, and the natural and human factors that make each one different. Written by two widely respected river ecologists, the book looks not only at rivers as they were and are but also at how they can be managed and cared for. Full of interesting facts and stunning images, Rivers is essential reading for anyone professionally involved in rivers and for the naturalist, conservationist and layman alike. It is the one book you need to understand this singularly important and often contentious feature of the British landscape.

It was most fortuitous that on his first visit to Charleston, John James Audubon would meet John Bachman, a Lutheran clergyman and naturalist. Their chance encounter in 1831 and immediate friendship profoundly affected the careers and social ties of these two men. In this elegantly written book, Jay Shuler offers the first in-depth portrayal of the Bachman-Audubon relationship and its significance in the creation of Audubon's works. In the numerous writings celebrating Audubon, Bachman has been largely ignored, writes Shuler, ""though Bachman made substantive contributions to Audubon's Ornithological Biographies, was his partner in The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America, and gave pivotal advice and assistance to Audubon during the troubled last decade of his career."" Drawing on their voluminous correspondence, replete with accounts of their ornithological adventures and details of their personal and professional lives, Had I the Wings provides new insights into Audubon's life and work and rescues from obscurity John Bachman's contributions to American ornithology and mammalogy. Audubon's career can be divided into phases. From 1820 to 1831 he painted and published the first hundred prints of The Birds of America. The second phase began when he met John Bachman and they worked to complete The Birds of America and launch The Quadrupeds. Over the next decade Bachman's home became, in effect, Audubon's home in America. Early on the Bachman-Audubon friendship was enriched and complicated by an intricate social web. Both men were fond of Bachman's sister-in-law and competed for her attention. Audubon's sons, John and Victor, married Bachman's older daughters, Maria and Eliza. Through the fifteen years of their relationship the friends exchanged long letters when separated and jointly wrote to their colleagues when together. In the early 1840s they collaborated on the first volume of The Quadrupeds. Volumes two and three were published after Audubon's death in 1851. Filled with exciting birding adventures and hunting expeditions, Had I the Wings illuminates the fascinating relationship between two major nineteenth-century naturalists.

Originally published in the early 1900s. The illustrated contents include: Description - Capture and Importation - Breeding Developments - Buying - Cages and Their Construction - Birdrooms and Aviaries - Foods and Feeding - Care - As a Talker and Pet - Breeding Difficulties - In-Breeding - Colour Varieties - Ailments and Treatment. Etc. Many of the earliest cage bird books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. Home Farm Books are republishing many of these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

For nearly a quarter century, the polar bears of Churchill were routinely run down and shot by the military, by residents and by conservation officers who were brought in during the late 1960s to protect people. According to one scientist who was there at the time, polar bears were treated more like "great white rats" than the world's largest predator. But then something remarkable happened. During the 1970s the residents of Churchill decided that it was time to find a more peaceful way of living with polar bears.
In the years that followed, scientists conducted studies on the polar bear population and in relatively short order the bears of Churchill became the most studied group of large predators in the world.

  Watch a thousand years unfold in the life of one magnificent tree! A thousand years ago, a tiny acorn fell to the ground. As the years pass, it grows . . . and GROWS into an enormous oak tree! As the centuries sweep by, children play games around the tree. Families dance about it. A fleeing king even hides inside its hollow trunk! The tree gives food and shelter to a host of animals, from squirrels and badgers to birds and beetles. After a thousand years, the ancient tree finally falls in a storm - but a new acorn sprouts, and the cycle of life begins all over again. The tree's magical life story is brought to life in Julia Donaldson's rich, dramatic rhyme. Victoria Sandøy's gorgeous, atmospheric illustrations perfectly capture the changing seasons, and the people and wildlife that pass by Children will love spotting all the creatures in the pictures, and seeing the games children play around the tree This is a book that encourages us all to look more closely at nature, and to appreciate the wonder of our ancient trees. The final pages of the book contain extra fascinating facts about oak trees and the animals that depend on them. Praise for The Christmas Pine, also by Julia Donaldson and Victoria Sandøy: "Magical . . . as well as paying tribute to tradition, the gentle rhythmic verse and stunning pictures illuminate the two other things close to Julia's heart: the power of children and song" Julia Donaldson is the author of many of the best-loved children's books ever written. She has been awarded a CBE for services to literature, and is the most celebrated children's writer in Britain today. Many of Julia Donaldson's beloved picture books have been made into award-winning animated films which are regularly shown on the BBC at Christmas.

In this short but informative guide, trusted authors Chris and Mathilde Stuart turn mammal ID on its head – literally. The identification of mammal skulls is the subject of this latest addition to the quirky ‘Quick Guide’ series, and covers the most common skulls readers are likely to encounter in the wild – from easily recognisable species such as elephant, hippo, rhino, baboons, antelope, whales and dolphins, to the more challenging family groups: dogs, cats, hyaenas, equids, pigs, civets and genets, mongooses, rats and mice, bats, sengis, shrews, moles, hares and rabbits, hyrax, and squirrels.
 
Each entry features:

• Close-up photographs showing the entire skull, teeth and, where available, upper and lower jaws
• Pointers to diagnostic features
• Average measurement for skull length
• Short description highlighting main features of each skull and tooth structure
• Dental formula for teeth in upper and lower jaws

Humans and grizzly bears have been coming into contact in Yellowstone National Park ever since it was founded in 1872. Most of these encounters have ended peacefully, but many have not. In order to most accurately tell the stories of those involved in the more deadly incidents, Kathleen Snow went directly to the source: the National Park Service archives. With help from personnel at park headquarters, Snow has collected more than 100 years' worth of hair-raising stories that read like crime scene investigations and provide hard-learned lessons in outdoor safety. A must-read for fans of Death in Yellowstone and anyone fascinated by human-animal interactions.