Bernd Heinrich has written “Summer World: A Season of Bounty.”
The NYT notes that the book: “will please fans of noncharismatic, non-mega fauna, but the book isn’t all splendor in the grass. There are snakes, too — the snakes of local extirpation and the first world’s unsustainable lifestyle.”
The author of 13 previous books, the product description notes:
“In Summer World: A Season of Bounty, Bernd Heinrich brings us the same bottomless reserve of wonder and reverence for the teeming animal life of backwoods New England that he brought us in Winter World: The Ingenuity of Animal Survival. Now he is focusing on the animal kingdom in the extremes of the warmer months, with all its feeding, nesting, fighting, and mating.
Whether presenting disquisitions on ant wars, the predatory characteristics of wasps, the mating rituals of woodpeckers, or describing an encounter with a road full of wood frogs, Summer World never stops observing the beautifully complex interactions of animals and plants with nature, giving extraordinary depth to the relationships between habitat and the warming of the earth. How can cicadas survive—and thrive—at temperatures pushing 115°F?
Do hummingbirds know what they're up against before they migrate over the Gulf of Mexico? Why do some trees stop growing taller even when three months of warm weather remain? With awe and unmatched expertise, Heinrich explores hundreds of questions like these.
Exquisitely illustrated with dozens of the author's own drawings, Summer World is Bernd Heinrich's most engaging book to date, a fascinating work from one of our very best science writers.”
Read the NYT review for more info. Ecco is the publisher.
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