I loved this book! It was funny and serious and completely full of little 4 page essays on a wide variety of topics. I didn't count but probably arounI loved this book! It was funny and serious and completely full of little 4 page essays on a wide variety of topics. I didn't count but probably around 60-70 of them. I learned a lot, and it inspired a lot of ideas for future research. My only complaint is that often there would be not enough information on a topic or the essay would feel rushed, but when you're getting the amount of variety and amount of essays in this book then you can't expect to learn everything you want. I bought this mostly to learn about slime mold, but only about 3-4 pages were about slime molds and it was mostly info I already knew, but there were plenty of topics I knew nothing about and now I do. Everything in here is useful information and I would recommend this to anybody that cares about the environment or wants to do a little learning....more
If you have a absolutely no knowledge on the subject of animal intelligence then this might be s book for you. If you were already interested then youIf you have a absolutely no knowledge on the subject of animal intelligence then this might be s book for you. If you were already interested then you probably don't need to bother. The author goes around asking other scientists if they think animals can be intelligent and it seems like he never decides what he thinks. There were chapters that weee interesting on birds, insects, plants, and slime molds to name a few, but then there were chaptere on humans and on machines, which seemed out of place. This is a good starting point on the subject, but there just wasn't enough information i didn't already know....more
An informative read, although still just barely touching the surface, on the world of plants and what makes them so amazing. The author writes in the An informative read, although still just barely touching the surface, on the world of plants and what makes them so amazing. The author writes in the final chapter about how his goal of the book is to just raise interest in plants in the hopes that you'll pass that interest along and people all around your community can start to care about the conservation of native plants. There were some good examples of different ways that we depend, or other animals depend on very specific plants in order to exist, and how the existence of those specific plants can be very fragile. Also some good examples of how plants pollinate and repopulate themselves, and how humans, or often times invasive plant species can make it hard for native plants to do those things which results in their population dying out. It's important for us to be aware of how we effect the planet, and if we want to continue to exist we need to make sure the things we need to exist are also safe and sound, like native plant species that keep our ecosystems functioning right. I was already aware of all of this but this book was a perfect reminder, and I also learned some cool facts I didn't know before. I would recommend this book to anybody but especially somebody who is maybe not aware of how important plants are to our own continued existence....more
41 essays on nature, mostly about birds but not always. Very well written. Helen Macdonald wraps each essay up with a little nugget of wisdom, making 41 essays on nature, mostly about birds but not always. Very well written. Helen Macdonald wraps each essay up with a little nugget of wisdom, making each essay about birds relatable to your own life, with the last essay literally being about how much we can learn from birds and other animals just by observing to them and knowing that they are not here for us, but to serve their own purpose. Honestly not a bad essay in the bunch, the only hard part was not reading it too fast so that I'd have time to reflect on each essay. Would recommend to anyone with any curiosity towards nature or wildlife....more
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