Heinrich is quintessentially the curious naturalist, happiest when
stalking the odd bird, pursuing caterpillars, or observing "rafts"
of whirligig beetles along a lakefront. In this charming and
stylish volume, he combines biographical details with his
economic-ecological approach to flora and fauna - embellishing the
whole with precisionist pencil drawings. The German-born zoologist
(now at the U. of Vermont) spent his earliest years escaping from
Russian-occupied areas. His family eventually settled in the woods,
gathering mushrooms and other edibles to exchange for goods in
town. Father was already a collector of rare birds for museums, so
young Heinrich clearly grew up in the naturalist tradition. Once in
the US, he describes his early academic career and a thesis on
thermoregulation in insects, the opposite of a senior scientist's.
Heinrich postulated - correctly - that certain moths maintained
constant temperature in flight (despite changing air temperatures)
by dissipating heat generated by flight muscles. This approach -
how species have evolved to use energy economically - later
developed into the basis of his impressive Bumblebee Economics
(1979). Now Heinrich pursues the same kind of
time-motion-energy-survival questions across a broader variety of
creatures. We follow his reasoning in examining whirligig behavior,
in a variety of predator/prey interactions, in studies of the gaudy
caterpillars that taste bad and the cryptic caterpillars that use
camouflage. An underlying theme is the co-evolution of species, the
sense of the inter-relatedness that has created the complex economy
of the natural world. This comes to the fore especially in the
title chapter, in which Heinrich describes the burned-out patch on
his Maine farmland that sees a succession of growth and invaders
beginning with the airborne seeds of fireweed. Finally, the
bumblebees descend to drink the fireweed nectar - and to inspire
Heinrich's magnum opus. To be read and savored for the writing, the
drawings, and the science. (Kirkus Reviews)
Why would a grown man chase hornets with a thermometer, paint
whirligig beetles bright red, or track elephants through the night
to fill trash bags with their prodigious droppings? Some might
say-to advance science. Bernd Heinrich says-because it's fun.
Heinrich, author of the much acclaimed Bumblebee Economics, has
been playing in the wilds of one continent or another all his life.
In the process, he has become one of the world's foremost
physiological ecologists. With In a Patch of Fireweed, he will
undoubtedly become one of our foremost writers of popular science.
Part autobiography, part case study in the ways of field biology,
In a Patch of Fireweed is an endlessly fascinating account of a
scientist's life and work. For the author, it is an opportunity to
report not just his results but the curiosity, humor, error,
passion, and competitiveness that feed into the process of
discovery. For the reader, it is simply a delight, a rare chance to
share the perceptions of an unusual mind fully in tune with the
inner workings of nature. Before his years of research in the
woodlands and deserts of North America, the New Guinea highlands,
and the plains of East Africa, Heinrich had a sense of the wild
that few people in this century can know. He tells the whole story,
from his refugee childhood hidden in a German forest, eating mice
fried in boar fat, to his ongoing research in the woods surrounding
his cabin in Maine.
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