All posts in Featured Books

Imagine that you are strolling through the forest on a fine summer morning. The birds are chirping merrily above your head, and an occasional squirrel scurries across the path in front of you. Suddenly, you reach a clearing, in the midst of which is a large pond. As you take a moment to look around, you suddenly notice a log floating carelessly through the water. Except, this is no ordinary log! Indeed, it appears to be moving! On closer inspection, you realize that this is not just a log, but a log covered with as many as 50 painted turtles, all basking in the warm summer sun. While you may never have experienced this yourself, this is indeed a sight which you might see should you find yourself around freshwater anywhere in North America from Southern Canada to northern Mexico. It is the sight of Chrysemys picta, also known as the Eastern Painted Turtle – the most common turtle in North America and one of the featured species this week on EOL.

Illustrations play an integral role in the work of taxonomists, and they lend a depth, beauty, and sometimes pure romanticism to the volumes containing them. Case in point: this week’s book of the week, Our Country’s Fishes and How to Know Them: A Guide to all the Fishes of Great Britain (1902) by W.J. Gordon. This charming book contains over 30 plates illustrating the myriad of ichthyoids found in Great Britain. Furthermore, the lists of these fish are itemized according to their local and popular names. As the author points out, the purpose of this volume is the “ready identification of our native species, whether sea-water, fresh-water, or estuarine…[and] as the number of species found in British waters is not large, space has been found for a series of short notes…” So, take a few moments to look through the colorful plates depicting the many and varied species of fish found in Great Britain, and feel free to keep a copy of these illustrations for yourself by downloading high resolution images of these pages by clicking on the “Download Images” options found in the drop down menu entitled “Download/About This Book” when on the page viewer screen. Enjoy!

For this week’s book of the week, we highlight another of EOL’s featured species – Sepia apama, perhaps better-known as the Australian Giant Cuttlefish. With a maximum recorded mantle length of 520 mm and a weight of 6.2 kg, the Sepia apama is the largest species of cuttlefish in the world.

Spring is in the air, and that means blooms are just around the corner! And this, of course, means that all you gardeners out there can dig your potting tools out of the shed and get ready to get your hands dirty. We thought we’d help by highlighting one of the many valuable gardening guides in our collection. As we sifted through our collection, one book in particular caught our eye.

To all you chocolate lovers out there: one of the featured species on EOL this week was Theobroma cacao, better known as Cacao, from whence chocolate is created. So, in the spirit of collaboration, and with a desire to feature something as deliciously addictive as chocolate, we thought we’d pull some inspiration from this featured botanical delight and showcase Theobroma cacao in this week’s book of the week. So, check out To the River Plate and back : the narrative of a scientific mission to South America, with observations upon things seen and suggested (1913), by W.J. Holland.

The awareness of the need to protect endangered species has grown widely in the past few decades. The decimation of species throughout the world due to both natural and man-made conditions has pushed many species to the brink of extinction. While there are many efforts underway to protect and revive the species on the endangered list today, the struggle of many species to survive is still uncertain. This week’s book of the week, Selected vertebrate endangered species of the seacoast of the United States (1980), published by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, outlines some of the species that were facing this battle for survival thirty years ago.

The lure of Antarctica has been captivating humans for hundreds of years, centuries even before the discovery of such a landmass occurred. Discussions about the existence of such a place were proposed as early as the first century AD, when Ptolemy suggested that there must be a giant landmass to the south serving to counterbalance the mass of the giant northern lands (Europe, Asia and North Africa) and preserve symmetry in the world. Following such proclamations, maps constructed as early as the 1500s began portraying a giant continent in the mysterious southern reaches of the globe. However, while belief in the existence of this southern continent permeated antiquity, it was not until the 1800s that confirmation of such a place actually occurred.