BBC Wildlife Magazine (June 1999)
This is what your coffee-table's been waiting for. Images by 23 of the United States' top wildlife photographers--including BBC Wildlife favourites such as Frans Lanting, Brandon D Cole and Jim Brandenburg--illustrate a tour through the continent's natural habitats, from forests and mountains through prairies, seashores and lakes to the snowy tundras of Alaska and the fiery deserts of the South-west. Amid the perhaps predictable grizzlies and bald eagles, there are some more unfamiliar creatures, such as the rockchuck, a mountain-dwelling member of the squirrel family, and the extraordinary eastern chicken turtle, which is just six inches long and can extend its neck for an amazing four inches. Wildlife journalist Thomas Lewis's essays evoke the enormous scale of the country and provide useful geographical, ecological and biological context to the awesome images. Leaf through, learn and enjoy.
Spectacular indeed! And at this price it should be. Fortunately, many of the 100 images in this oversized book are very striking, covering the animal world from lynx and moose in the Canadian North to alligators and herons in the Florida Everglades. There are wonderful shots of a mountain lion stalking, a grizzly bear showing his fearsome displeasure, a coyote in pursuit of a vole and a group of quizzical walruses (no carpenter in sight).
Did you know that puma parents take nearly two years to teach their young the tricks of that carnivore's trade? Or that a beaver's lips shut behind its front teeth and its tongue seals the throat, enabling nature's civil engineer to gnaw wood while under water? Or that eagles have bifocular vision, which allows them to spot a mouse from a thousand feet above, then inspect the critter while consuming it? Or that beluga whales can bend their necks?
Wildlife of North America is replete with this kind of interesting information about the birds, fish, and mammals that inhabit our continent. It's also full of really fine, large photographs of animals, from bats to bears, from manatees to moose. A shot of two mountain lion kittens jogging along a snowy ridge in Montana is enough to make you want to adopt one. The photo of a wolverine at full run will give you a shiver at the thought of its target's fate. The ferocity and power of the wolverine are greater by far than those of any animal its size. All animal lovers will relish both the text and the 150 full-color photographs in this handsome, fascinating book.