Nature

A magnificent illustrated journey into California’s famed deserts and the astonishingly abundant life they contain.

2023 Glenn Goldman Award Winner for California Lifestyle, Chosen by the California Independent Booksellers Alliance

A San Francisco Chronicle Bestseller!

From Obi Kaufmann, author-illustrator of the best-selling California Field Atlas, comes a grand adventure through time, geography, and ecology in California’s deserts. Of a piece with his richly illustrated books The Forests of California and The Coasts of California, this volume features hundreds of vivid watercolor maps and illustrations, blending art and science to breathtaking effect. Journeying through the Great Basin, Mojave, Colorado, and Sonoran Deserts, Kaufmann pays special attention to national and state parks and monuments, and to the dozens of wilderness areas that reveal the underappreciated natural abundance of California’s arid lands.

From Joshua Tree to Death Valley, these deserts full of life, as Kaufmann evokes them, are perfect places for meditating on our future, and for imagining a California that might thrive beyond the age of climate breakdown. The Deserts of California is a canonical entry into the literature of the American deserts, uniquely colorful and celebratory, and abounding in hope and wonder.

Learn about the wildlife of the Bay Area from a lifelong protector of endangered species, and enjoy the wild ride.

Jeff Miller's quirky guide to the coolest animal neighbors in the Bay Area will have you gawking at elk, whooping with cranes, and crowning yourself a crossing guard for newts before you know it. Join Jeff on a local safari to meet more than sixty species of mammals, birds, fish, reptiles, amphibians, and insects, and discover the fascinating and sometimes bizarre mating, feeding, and athletic antics of our most charismatic animals.

Portraits by Obi Kaufmann, the renowned conservationist artist who created The California Field Atlas, bring each animal to vivid life alongside fun facts, comical photos, and maps to help you scope out the best spots to find your furred, feathered, slimy, and slithery friends. Imbued with the author’s deep compassion for the well-being of our local fauna, Bay Area Wildlife reveals why each of these creatures matters, as well as the threats that loom over our region's incredible biodiversity.

An insightful look at the historical damages early colonizers of America caused and how their descendants may recognize and heal the harm done to the earth and the native peoples

Inherited Silence tells the story of beloved land in California’s Napa Valley—how the land fared during the onslaught of colonization and how it fares now in the drought, development, and wildfires that are the consequences of the colonial mind. Author Louise Dunlap’s ancestors were among the first Europeans to claim ownership of traditional lands of the Wappo people during a period of genocide. As settlers, her ancestors lived the dream of Manifest Destiny, their consciousness changing only gradually over the generations.

When Dunlap’s generation inherited the land, she had already begun to wonder about its unspoken story. What had kept her ancestors from seeing and telling the truth of their history? What had they brought west with them from the very earliest colonial experience in New England? Dunlap looks back into California’s and America’s history for the key to their silences and a way to heal the wounds of the land, its original people, and the harmful mind of the colonizer.

It’s a powerful story that will awaken others to consider their own ancestors’ role in colonization and encourage them to begin reparations for the harmful actions of those who came before. More broadly, it offers a way for every reader to evaluate their own current life actions and the lasting impact they can have on society and our planet.

Nature isn't only in a park or wilderness. It’s right outside our door Sometimes it’s on the door or comes inside to find us. Nature is the jumping spider on the screen, the assassin bug in the shower, and the cluster of ladybugs at the lamp. It is the moss on brick where gutters spill, a sycamore sprout in the storm drain, and the trash can lid turned into a bird bath.

Joanna Brichetto is a neurodiverse, late-blooming naturalist with a sharp eye. Despite having chronic illnesses, she spends much of her time exploring nature and has an infectious, almost zealous love for the flora and fauna near and in her Nashville home. In This Is How a Robin Drinks, Brichetto weaves observation, reflection, and commentary with unsentimental wit and an earthy humor into an urban almanac of fifty-two short lyrical essays.

Each piece offers a sketch of everyday wonders in everyday habitat loss. Nature is the dead sparrow in the pickup line at the elementary school, a full moon over the electric substation, and the cicada chorus that doesn’t make a days-long migraine any better (but doesn’t make it any worse either). Nature is under our feet, over our heads, and beside us—the very places we need to know first. Arranged by season, the pieces in this collection celebrate nature—just as it is—on the sidewalk and in the backyard, the park, and the parking lot.

A herpetologist introduces budding snake enthusiasts to the wonders of California snakes.

"I've loved snakes since childhood and am thrilled to now have this gorgeous book as my companion to finding snakes wherever a walk on the wild side takes me." —Amy Tan, author of The Joy Luck Club and The Backyard Bird Chronicles

Fear of snakes is one of the most common phobias in the world, yet step into any local zoo and you'll find the snake pit to be among these menageries' greatest attractions. In this entrancing ode to the charms of California's legless reptiles, rattlesnake wrangler Emily Taylor shares her knowledge, enthusiasm, and advice for getting to know our slithering neighbors, dispelling the usual misapprehensions that surround them and celebrating their striking biological traits along the way.

Featuring profiles of the nearly 50 fork-tongued species that burrow and coil in California's diverse habitats, and containing tips for serpent seekers—including identification guides and handling advice—California Snakes and How to Find Them delves into the longstanding myths and latest natural history research on our ophidian friends of the West. Taylor showcases the biodiversity of California's snakes, from the Common Garter to the fetchingly pink Rosy Boa to the elusive Alameda Striped Racer, illustrated with more than 100 detailed photographs. Supported with critical insights—such as what to do during a venomous encounter, and an exploration of the seemingly simple question, What is a snake?—this guide is the perfect companion for both the seasoned naturalist and the budding snake enthusiast.

Ride across California on the back of the wind and learn about the dramatic impact that seasonal weather and climate change have on the Golden State.

"Selby's greatest gift to readers is to reveal the climate as an indomitable equalizer." —Los Angeles Times

Often stereotyped as the land of unflaggingly perfect weather, California has a world-renowned reputation for sunny blue skies and infinitely even-keeled temperatures. But the real story of the state's weather is vastly more complex. From the scorching heat of Death Valley to the coastal redwoods' dripping in dew, California is home to a dizzying array of landscapes and bespoke weather patterns. In The California Sky Watcher, earth scientist William A. Selby takes readers on a journey through the seasons and across the state, exploring the atmospheric science that connects us all under our single sky dome.

With more than 125 photographs, diagrams, and explanatory charts, Selby guides us through the grand cycles that govern the world we see, feel, and hear every day, from the cirrus clouds that swirl overhead to the breezes that beckon us outside. Unraveling the mysteries behind the state's fog, floods, fires, droughts, and snowstorms, Selby shares his love affair with the sky and reveals what these changeable energies forecast for the future of California's climate.

Braiding together illustration, observation, and reportage, artist and naturalist Robin Lee Carlson offers a watershed work that will forever change how we live with wildfire in the West.

When the nature reserve at Cold Canyon went up in flames—a casualty of California’s raging fire seasons—Robin Lee Carlson embarked on a five-year journey to learn the legacy of the burn. Spurred by scientific curiosity, Carlson’s deep digs into the natural history of this fire-swept ecosystem unearth mind-bending revelations about nature’s wild wisdom. Her transformative story of fire as a force for renewal underscores what scientists are urgently working to understand: that in California’s wildfire ecologies, fire functions as an elemental power that does not destroy the diverse habitats of California, but regenerates them. Richly illustrated in pen, ink, and watercolor, this snapshot of Cold Canyon’s wildlife emerging from the ashes introduces the reader to the wonder of ecological kinship and its cycles in our wild lands. Carlson’s artistic and scientific journey ultimately leads her (and us) to a new understanding of how we must live in relationship to fire and to the land. With fire suppression and climate change undermining the essential regenerative work of fire in our ecosystem, Carlson’s story is an urgent one—one that shows us how cultivating intimacy with our natural world teaches us what we need to do to sustain it.

Now expanded and updated: Californians’ favorite reference book to trees in our everyday lives.

"Anyone who is curious about trees is sure to find education and inspiration in these pages."—David Allen Sibley, author of The Sibley Guide to Trees and The Sibley Guide to Birds

For more than ten years, A Californian’s Guide to the Trees among Us has taught Californians the what, why, and how of trees in our cities and towns. This edition has been updated by the author to reflect new trends in urban forestry, with a revised introduction, updated taxonomy and nomenclature, and more than ten additional species featured.

Matt Ritter introduces us to over 160 of California’s most commonly grown urban trees in this expanded edition of his best-selling book. Whether native or cultivated, these are the trees that muffle noise, create wildlife habitats, mitigate pollution, conserve energy, and make urban living healthier and more peaceful. Used as a field guide or read with pleasure for the liveliness of the prose, this book will allow readers to learn the stories behind the trees that shade our parks, grace our yards, and line our streets. Rich in photographs and illustrations, overflowing with anecdote and information, A Californian’s Guide to the Trees among Us opens our eyes to a world of beauty just outside our front doors.

The author of California Snakes and How to Find Them invites budding reptile enthusiasts into a wonderland of lizards.

"This guide joyfully celebrates the beauty and quirkiness of our native lizards." —John Muir Laws

Lizards: they are cute, endearing, and mind-bogglingly diverse, and yet they are so easy to overlook among California’s natural abundance. Start watching them, though, and a wonderland of lizard life appears. In California Lizards and How to Find Them, lizard lover Emily Taylor profiles over 60 native and introduced species, from California's iconic Western Fence Lizard to the adorable Desert Iguana to the chonky Ringed Wall Gecko. With her expert knowledge and joyous, laugh-out-loud writing, Taylor provides tips for finding, watching, and responsibly catching lizards. She offers absorbing insights on lizard evolution, and she explains the toll of invasive lizard species on California's ecosystems. Featuring more than 100 full-color photographs, and designed for easy use in everyday life, this is the ideal guide for budding reptile enthusiasts and longtime naturalists alike.

A deep dive into the Bay Area’s ecological treasure trove—and how this wild mountain in our midst was saved.

Explore the taste of the Sierra with foraging expert Mia Andler, and learn how to responsibly forage and deliciously prepare the wild plants that commonly grow in the Tahoe and northern Sierra Nevada regions.

In this guide to the common edible plants of the Sierra Nevada, Andler offers practical advice for gathering food from the land, in a friendly voice full of rich knowledge of the montane regions of California. Whether hiking high above Yosemite or foraging at the outskirts of Lake Tahoe or Mammoth, with The Sierra Forager you’ll discover each of the region’s most readily available—and delightfully delectable—edible plants.

With clear instructions for responsible harvesting, Andler connects readers and adventurers to the land’s seasonality and bounteous botany in a manner that fosters respectful, reciprocal caretaking of our wild spaces. Large, detailed photographs assist in identifying plants easily, and 44 simple recipes help you enjoy them, from campfire blackberry pie to manzanita muffins to birch leaf soda! This is the perfect guide for beginners, and it includes mouthwatering innovations to delight foragers of any experience level.

Updated for the first time in twenty years with completely redrawn birds and more, the classic and remarkably easy-to-use guide for identifying birds in the Sierra Nevada.

John Muir Laws began his lifelong project of connecting people to the natural world when he noticed that novice birders often distinguish birds by color and size rather than by family, genus, and species. Inspired by his observation, he created a guide to Sierra birds that assumes no prior birding knowledge on the part of the reader. The guide became the most popular of its kind, used frequently by local birders and visitors alike. Now updated for the first time in twenty years, The Laws Field Guide to Sierra Birds—originally published as Sierra Birds: A Hiker’s Guide—features fully redrawn color illustrations throughout.

Color-coded keys eliminate the time-consuming frustration of thumbing randomly through a guide, and a cross-index is also included for more advanced birders. All this in a format that is simply organized, lightweight, and small enough to tuck inside a pocket. Featuring more than 200 species, The Laws Field Guide to Sierra Birds is a friendly, invaluable resource for anyone seeking to identify birds in the Sierra Nevada mountain range.

Philadelphia Trees is a pocket-sized resource for identifying the native trees, commonly encountered exotics, and popular ornamentals of the Philadelphia metropolitan area and adjacent counties in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware. Each of the 118 tree-identification entries features a description of a tree species or several related species; a list of places to see specimens; individual photos of leaves, bark, fruits, and seeds; striking portrait photos; and winter-silhouette drawings.

The guide also contains a section on more than fifty of the best parks, botanical gardens, and preserves for viewing trees in and around Philadelphia. Included in this section are ten maps identifying specific trees in such places as Fairmount Park, one of the world’s largest urban parks, and the Morris Arboretum, the official arboretum of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

A third section, “Great Trees of Philadelphia,” highlights fifty special, historic, and record-breaking trees. Using this field guide, nature lovers will be able to identify and locate the fantastic trees that this unique region, sometimes called “the cradle of American horticulture,” has to offer.

The first book of a major new trilogy from artist-naturalist Obi Kaufmann.

"A call to action … full of beautiful watercolor renderings of both landscape and data."—Los Angeles Times

From the author of The California Field Atlas (#1 San Francisco Chronicle Best Seller) comes a major work that not only guides readers through the Golden State’s forested lands, but also presents a profoundly original vision of nature in the twenty-first century. The Forests of California features an abundance of Obi Kaufmann’s signature watercolor maps and trail paintings, weaving them into an expansive and accessible exploration of the biodiversity that defines California in the global imagination. Expanding on the style of the Field Atlas, Kaufmann tells an epic story that spans millions of years, nearly one hundred species of trees, and an astonishing richness of ecosystems. The Forests of California is the first volume in a planned trilogy of field atlases, with The Coasts of California and The Deserts of California to follow, and Kaufmann seeks to create nothing less than a new understanding of the more-than-human world. The lessons in this book extend well beyond California’s borders. If Peter Wohlleben’s The Hidden Life of Trees and Richard Powers’s The Overstory opened readers’ eyes to the awesome power of arboreal life, The Forests of California gives readers a unique and unprecedented immersion in that power.

Explores the contours of Latinx Catholic environmentalism

Home-based conservationist measures such as cultivating backyard gardens, avoiding consumerism, and limiting waste are widespread among Spanish-speaking Catholics across the United States. Yet these home-based conservationist practices are seldom recognized as “environmental” because they are enacted by working-class immigrant communities and do not conform to the expectations of mainstream environmentalism.

In Falling in Love with Nature, Amanda J. Baugh tells the story of American environmentalism through a focus on Spanish-speaking Catholics, shedding light on environmental actors who have been hidden in plain sight. While dominant narratives about environmental activism include minorities, primarily in the realm of environmental racism and injustice, Baugh demonstrates that minority communities are not merely victims of environmental problems. They can be active agents who express love for nature based on inherited family traditions and close relationships with the land. Baugh shows that Spanish-speaking Catholics have values that have been overlooked in global discourses, grassroots movements, and the highest echelons of the US Catholic Church. By drawing attention to the environmental knowledge that is already abundant within Spanish-speaking Catholic communities, Falling in Love with Nature challenges readers to rethink their assumptions about who can be an environmental leader and what counts as environmentalism.

Don’t be afraid of the dark: grab a flashlight and rediscover your sense of adventure!

Darkness is something humans strive to keep at bay, but under the glow of twilight a nocturnal universe stirs to life. Nightshade blossoms bloom, javelinas parade down city streets, fox eyes gleam under the cover of the forest, and tiny sparrows fly incredible distances, guided by the stars. Naturalist Charles Hood and bat biologist José Gabriel Martínez-Fonseca unravel these enigmas in Nocturnalia, inviting readers on an environmental romp through the wonders of the Wild West. Their sundown dispatches, featuring over 100 photographs from California and the American Southwest, take us from the astronomical canopy overhead, to the flora that unfurl under moonshine, to the creatures that go bump in the night.

With practical tips for the budding nighttime naturalist, the authors invite citizen scientists of all stripes to expand our knowledge of this final frontier and our understanding of life on Earth. Exploring the evolutionary adaptations of owls, bats, and other nightlife animals; the natural history of nighttime plants; and the celestial patterns that regulate this after-dark kingdom, Hood and Martínez-Fonseca lift their lanterns to illuminate the exquisite and intricate inner workings of nature after nightfall.

A guide to the ecosystem famously known as Los Angeles, from a field biologist and longtime San Gabriel Valley resident.

"A worthy and illuminating entry in the tradition of works exploring urbanization’s effect on the environment." —Los Angeles Times

Within the sprawling metropolis of Los Angeles and its suburbs, residents coexist—often unknowingly—with a bustling mosaic of native and introduced wildlife. Conservationist Craig Stanford, whose research has taken him around the world, now takes a deep dive into the natural history of his Southern California home. Stanford's informed and vivid accounts of more than 150 species entreat us to appreciate the ecological marvels of sagebrush and skunks and skippers, the iconic palms of LA lore, and the mountain lions still roaming the hills.

These portraits of the glamorous, humble, irritating, and altogether fascinating species that live alongside Angelenos urge us to recognize that even in a jungle of concrete, we live within nature. Witty and captivating, and combining cutting-edge research with his own critter encounters, Stanford demonstrates the beauty of shaping our cities to support biodiversity, and he warns against the threats that can tip urban ecosystems out of balance, leaving us in a much lonelier world.

Ideal for any experience level, The Bay Area Forager invites readers to deepen their relationship with their environment.

Reading this guidebook is like taking a wild foods walk with foraging experts Mia Andler and Kevin Feinstein: it gives practical advice for gathering edible wild plants in the Bay Area in a voice that is friendly and suffused with rich personal knowledge. The authors provide thorough descriptions of where to find each of the region's most readily available plants, and they give clear instructions for harvesting them responsibly. Large, detailed photographs help readers to identify plants easily. Also included are mouth-watering recipes such as cattail crêpes, cherry laurel cordial, fiddlehead fusilli, and rosehip soup.

This scientifically accurate yet utterly charming field guide to the Pacific coast intertidal zone introduces readers to a world populated by spectacular wildlife.

Explore 150-year-old giant green anemones that paralyze their prey with their petal-like tentacles; sunflower sea stars that traverse the tide pool floor on twenty-four limbs; orange-tipped, opalescent sea slugs that dabble in cannibalism; and much, much more. Small enough to fit in a back pocket during a beach hike, this guide contains concise descriptions of tide pools' most common residents, noting each organism's size and zonation, as well as a few of its fascinating (and sometimes grotesque) habits. Full-color illustrations reminiscent of prints by Ernst Haeckel help tide poolers with easy identification, and tips for viewing help you explore the abundance that tide pools have to offer.

As its sister title, A Californian's Guide to the Trees Among Us, did for arboreal varieties, this new guidebook introduces casual birders to 120 of California's most easily seen bird species—native and exotic alike—as found in a mix of urban, suburban, and traditionally natural habitats.

Full-color images and clear, direct descriptions make identification easy, and author Charles Hood supplements the essential information with surprising facts and trivia, including endangered-species recovery stories and the world record for grasshoppers eaten by one flycatcher in a single day. In sections addressing which gear to buy, where to go birdwatching, and how to read a birdsong transcription, Hood encourages readers to take ownership of their experiences, no matter their level of ornithological expertise. This accurate, lively, and even quotable guide will inspire people to notice nature more closely and find joy in interacting with the astounding diversity of avian life in California.

Honorable Mention, Outstanding Publication Award, given by the Environmental Sociology Section of the American Sociological Association

A riveting portrait of the cultural struggles and political conflicts of proposed copper-nickel mines in Minnesota’s Iron Range

On an unseasonably warm October afternoon in Saint Paul, hundreds of people gathered to protest the construction of a proposed copper-nickel mine in the rural northern part of their state. The crowd eagerly listened to speeches on how the project would bring long-term risks and potentially pollute the drinking water for current and future generations. A year later, another proposed mining project became the subject of a public hearing in a small town near the proposed site. But this time, local politicians and union leaders praised the mine proposal as an asset that would strengthen working-class communities in Minnesota.

In many rural American communities, there is profound tension around the preservation and protection of wilderness and the need to promote and profit from natural resources. In Mining the Heartland, Erik Kojola looks at both sides of these populist movements and presents a thoughtful account of how such political struggles play out. Drawing on over a hundred ethnographic interviews with people of the region, from members of labor unions to local residents to scientists, Kojola is able to bring this complex struggle over mining to life. Focusing on both pro- and anti-mining groups, he expands upon what this conflict reveals about the way whiteness and masculinity operate among urban and rural residents, and the different ways in which class, race, and gender shape how people relate to the land. Mining the Heartland shows the negotiation and conflict between two central aspects of the state's culture and economy: outdoor recreation in the Land of Ten Thousand Lakes and the lucrative mining of the Iron Range.

Now updated with a new preface: a full-color celebration of coexistence with California's iconic wildlife.

Wildness beats in the heart of California's urban areas, and across the state Californians are taking action to recast wildlife as an integral part of our everyday lives. In Los Angeles, residents rallied to build one of the largest wildlife crossings in the world because of the plight of one lonely mountain lion named P-22. Porpoises cavort in San Francisco Bay again because of a grassroots effort to clean up a waterway that was once a toxic mess. Yosemite's park staff and millions of visitors have mobilized to keep its famed bears wild. And after a near century-long absence, Californians are welcoming wolves back to the state, inspired by the remarkable journey of the wolf OR-7. When Mountain Lions Are Neighbors explores this evolving dynamic between humans and animals. Now updated with a new preface, these inspiring stories celebrate a new model for wildlife conservation: coexistence.

A Next Generation Indie Book Award Finalist

''I love this book. It reads like a walk in the woods with the best naturalists."—John Muir Laws

A Californian may vacation in Yosemite, Big Sur, or Death Valley, but many of us come home to an oak woodland. Yet, while common, oak woodlands are anything but ordinary. In a book rich in illustration and suffused with wonder, author Kate Marianchild combines extensive research and years of personal experience to explore some of the marvelous plants and animals that the oak woodlands nurture. Acorn woodpeckers unite in marriages of up to ten mates and raise their young cooperatively. Ground squirrels roll in rattlesnake skins to hide their scent from hungry snakes. Manzanita's rust-colored, paper-thin bark peels away in time for the summer solstice, exposing sinuous contours that are cool to the touch even on the hottest day. Conveying up-to-the-minute scientific findings with a storyteller's skill, Marianchild introduces us to a host of remarkable creatures in a world close by, a world that “rustles, hums, and sings with the sounds of wild things.”

In the same lighthearted yet scientifically accurate style of Fylling's Illustrated Guide to Pacific Coast Tide Pools, this portable guidebook reveals the splendidly strange animals and plants just outside your door.

Marni Fylling's full-color illustrations make species identification a snap, and concise descriptions include fascinating (and sometimes grotesque) factoids about frequently encountered plants, insects, arachnids, birds, and mammals. With Fylling's guidance, the everyday becomes extraordinary: Pigeons share nest-building and egg-sitting duties, and mate for life—with occasional dalliances; squirrel teeth grow about six inches per year; spiders owe their characteristic creep to their "hydraulic" legs; poison oak and poison ivy’s itch-inducing oil is also found in pistachios, cashews, and mangoes; and much, much more.

A groundbreaking collection that explores human–animal relations and deaths with depth and hope

When Animals Die is an innovative collection of essays that delves into the intricate and uneasy dynamics between humans and other-than-human animals, particularly concerning animal deaths, which are predominantly caused by humans. This groundbreaking book brings together prominent scholars from various disciplines to address the challenging field of animal death studies, incorporating perspectives from social sciences, humanities, biological sciences, and perspectives from beyond academia.

The collection explores profound questions about the experience of animal death for both animals and humans. It examines how humans rationalize animal deaths and utilize deceased animals, and sheds light on the interconnectedness of animal death with issues like race, colonialism, gender, capitalism, and other systems of inequality that humans have established and perpetuated.

By confronting these pertinent issues, When Animals Die seeks to deepen our awareness of the relationship between animal death and humanity’s involvement in it. While grappling with the reality of humans’ impact on the earth, the collection offers hope for an alternative future that does not entail the mutual destruction of human and other-than-human animals.

A quirky and reverent romp through nature with an irreverently funny guide.

"Among nature writers now working, Charles Hood may be my favorite. He never stops telling stories, and his perspective is fundamentally comic, even when he's recounting a tragedy." —Jonathan Franzen

In these wry and explosively funny essays, nature obsessive Charles Hood reveals his abiding affection for the overlooked and undervalued parts of the natural world. Like a Bill Bryson of the Mojave exurbs, Hood takes us on a joyride through the obscure, finding wilderness in Hollywood palms, the airports of Alaska, and the empty lots of Palmdale. In a zinger-filled whirl of literary and artistic allusions, he celebrates Audubon’s droopy condor, the world-changing history of a cactus parasite, and the weird art of natural history dioramas. This debut collection of creative nonfiction from a widely published poet, photographer, and wildlife guide unveils the wonderment of nature’s underbelly with poetic vision and singular wit.

WINNER OF THE 2021 DELMOS JONES AND JAGNA SHARFF MEMORIAL PRIZE FOR THE CRITICAL STUDY OF NORTH AMERICA!

Uncovers the hidden costs and contradictions of sustainable policies in an era driven by real estate development

From state-of-the-art parks to rooftop gardens, efforts to transform New York City’s unsightly industrial waterfronts into green, urban oases have received much public attention. In The Sustainability Myth, Melissa Checker uncovers the hidden costs—and contradictions—of the city’s ambitious sustainability agenda in light of its equally ambitious redevelopment imperatives.

Focusing on industrial waterfronts and historically underserved places like Harlem and Staten Island’s North Shore, Checker takes an in-depth look at the dynamics of environmental gentrification, documenting the symbiosis between eco-friendly initiatives and high-end redevelopment and its impact on out-of-the-way, non-gentrifying neighborhoods. At the same time, she highlights the valiant efforts of local environmental justice activists who work across racial, economic, and political divides to challenge sustainability’s false promises and create truly viable communities.

The Sustainability Myth is a cautionary, eye-opening tale, taking a hard—but ultimately hopeful—look at environmental justice activism and the politics of sustainability.

In The Sea Forager's Guide to the Northern California Coast, Kirk Lombard combines a startling depth of knowledge with wry humor and colorful storytelling to guide readers' quests to hook fish, dig clams, and pick seaweed for themselves.

"Lombard is a divinely inspired whack job—think Frank Zappa meets Aldo Leopold. If you have ever considered the idea of gathering something good to eat from the beach or surf … you need this book."—Bill Heavy, editor-at-large, Field & Stream

Lombard, a former staff member at the state Department of Fish and Game and founder of the foraging tour company/seafood delivery service Sea Forager Seafood, insists that his readers follow all regulations and encourages sustainable practices above and beyond what the State of California requires. This quirky and useful how-to is sure to inspire an empowering epicurean adventure. Leighton Kelly's stunning, occasionally idiosyncratic illustrations complement practical instructions for gathering a variety of fish and seafood and delicious recipes for what to do with each catch.

Tackles a human problem we all share―the fate of the earth and our role in its future

Confident that your personal good deeds of environmental virtue will save the earth? The stories we encounter about the environment in popular culture too often promote an imagined moral economy, assuring us that tiny acts of voluntary personal piety, such as recycling a coffee cup, or purchasing green consumer items, can offset our destructive habits. No need to make any fundamental structural changes. The trick is simply for the consumer to buy the right things and shop our way to a greener future.

It’s time for a reality check. Ecopiety offers an absorbing examination of the intersections of environmental sensibilities, contemporary expressions of piety and devotion, and American popular culture. Ranging from portrayals of environmental sin and virtue such as the eco-pious depiction of Christian Grey in Fifty Shades of Grey, to the green capitalism found in the world of mobile-device “carbon sin-tracking” software applications, to the socially conscious vegetarian vampires in True Blood, the volume illuminates the work pop culture performs as both a mirror and an engine for the greening of American spiritual and ethical commitments.

Taylor makes the case that it is not through a framework of grim duty or obligation, but through one of play and delight, that we may move environmental ideals into substantive action.

A free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press’s Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more.

Protecting special places in danger of being changed forever requires urgent action. It’s time for bold conservation strategies to boost land protection around the world.

Bold conservation goals require strategic action. In Protecting the Places We Love: Conservation Strategies for Entrusted Lands and Parks, conservationist and geospatial designer Breece Robertson applies her conservation experience, real-world examples, and myriad resources to deliver a vision for success and clear guidance for conservation groups large and small to achieve their goals.

The goals of these strategies are familiar: support species, habitats, and natural resources and healthy, livable communities that are climate resilient and socially cohesive, all without high costs. Robertson's tools, many of them free, feel quickly accessible, effective, and adaptable to a new or existing conservation strategy. Readers finish this book feeling confident about integrating existing practices with geospatial data and modern applications.

With the smart analysis and targeted action explained in Protecting the Places We Love, readers will better identify places needing protection and better understand how to maximize partnerships, inspire, educate, and engage communities and donors, and produce better results.

See the vision and learn to:

• create maps that tell compelling stories to stakeholders and the public
• analyze park system equity and access and show the economic benefits
• map, model, and analyze land characteristics to enhance biodiversity, connectivity, and climate resilience
• use maps and data to gain insights for fundraising, program initiatives, policy, advocacy, finances, and marketing.  

Protecting the Places We Love is perfect for citizens, and for conservation advocates and professionals at small to medium-sized land trusts, conservation organizations, and park agencies. Examples from land protection organizations all over the globe provide field-tested approaches to improve strategic effectiveness. Robertson provides a vision, strategies, and resources that can take your conservation efforts to the next level.

Discover The Geographic Approach to help restore, preserve, and protect the environment.

As we continue to uncover and learn about ecological challenges facing our planet, the job of environmental and natural resource management organizations is becoming increasingly difficult. Finding a Sustainable Balance: GIS for Environmental Management explores a collection of real-life stories about how environmental and natural resource management organizations successfully use geographic information systems (GIS) to monitor environmental assets in real time and provide transparency for better outcomes for all, to track environmental assets, and to prevent environmental hazards from becoming disasters.

Learn how GIS can help improve operations across

• land and wildlife management,
• outdoor recreation, and
• environmental regulation.

The book also includes a section on next steps that provides helpful ideas, strategies, tools, and actions to help jump-start your use of GIS for environmental management. A collection of online resources, including additional stories, videos, new ideas and concepts, and downloadable tools and content, complements this book.

A New York Times 100 Best Books of the 21st Century Readers Pick 

#1 New York Times Bestseller

A Washington Post and Los Angeles Times Bestseller

As a botanist, Robin Wall Kimmerer has been trained to ask questions of nature with the tools of science. As a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, she embraces the notion that plants and animals are our oldest teachers. In Braiding Sweetgrass, Kimmerer brings these two lenses of knowledge together to take us on "a journey that is every bit as mythic as it is scientific, as sacred as it is historical, as clever as it is wise" (Elizabeth Gilbert).

Drawing on her life as an indigenous scientist, and as a woman, Kimmerer shows how other living beings—asters and goldenrod, strawberries and squash, salamanders, algae, and sweetgrass—offer us gifts and lessons, even if we've forgotten how to hear their voices. In reflections that range from the creation of Turtle Island to the forces that threaten its flourishing today, she circles toward a central argument: that the awakening of ecological consciousness requires the acknowledgment and celebration of our reciprocal relationship with the rest of the living world. For only when we can hear the languages of other beings will we be capable of understanding the generosity of the earth, and learn to give our own gifts in return.

A free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press’s Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more.

In Paraguay’s Chaco region, cattle ranching drives some of the world’s fastest deforestation and most extreme inequality in land tenure, with grave impacts on Indigenous well‑being. Disrupting the Patrón traces Enxet and Sanapaná struggles to reclaim their ancestral lands from the cattle ranches where they labored as peons—a decades-long resistance that led to the Inter‑American Court of Human Rights and back to the frontlines of Paraguay’s ranching frontier. The Indigenous communities at the heart of this story employ a dialectics of disruption by working with and against the law to unsettle enduring racial geographies and rebuild territorial relations, albeit with uncertain outcomes. Joel E. Correia shows that Enxet and Sanapaná peoples enact environmental justice otherwise: moving beyond juridical solutions to harm by maintaining collective lifeways and resistance amid radical social-ecological change. Correia’s ethnography advances debates about environmental racism, ethics of engaged research, and Indigenous resurgence on Latin America’s settler frontiers.

Winner, 2020 ASCA Book Award, given by the Amsterdam School of Cultural Analysis

A groundbreaking argument for the political rights of animals

In When Animals Speak, Eva Meijer develops a new, ground-breaking theory of language and politics, arguing that non-human animals speak—and, most importantly, act—politically. From geese and squid to worms and dogs, she highlights the importance of listening to animal voices, introducing ways to help us bridge the divide between the human and non-human world.

Drawing on insights from science, philosophy, and politics, Meijer provides fascinating, real-world examples of animal communities who use their voices to speak, and act, in political ways. When Animals Speak encourages us to rethink our relations with other animals, showing that their voices should be taken into account as the starting point for a new interspecies democracy.

An essential resource for outdoor enthusiasts in California.

With his vibrant photographs and lively writing, Matt Ritter takes the reader on a journey through the Golden State's iconic landscapes and abundant plant life.

This definitive guide includes:

• Over 300 pages with more than 500 species described and photographed
  
• More than 1,000 full-color photographs and 150 species range maps
• Detailed descriptions and fascinating natural history stories
• California tree identification flowchart
• Wildflower identification color guide
• Detailed glossary and comprehensive index

A portion of the proceeds from each book supports the California Native Plant Society and The Wildlands Conservancy. The book features a foreword by Jerry Brown, former Governor of California.

• the processes and oversight needed to ensure the safety of drinking water
• the role of the precautionary principle in managing drinking water
• potential solutions for expanding sustainable and equitable access to safe drinking water

2024 Outstanding Academic Title, given by Choice Reviews

The environmental history of “the most polluted lake in America.”
​​
Native Americans have long regarded Onondaga Lake as one of the most sacred spaces in the continent, the place where peace between nations was achieved and the Haudenosaunee Confederacy was created. In the mid-twentieth century, however, it acquired a wholly different reputation as “the most polluted lake in America.” Toxic Lake is an environmental history of this complex ecological system, tracking how it was tarnished, the costly efforts to clean it up, and the controversies those efforts generated.

Thomas Shevory argues that the history of Onondaga Lake mirrors the larger environmental history of the US, from colonization to the industrial era, resulting, eventually, in the rise of social movements and legislative action for environmental protection. Layered within this history is the dismissal of indigenous land claims and the marginalization of indigenous voices in clean-up efforts. Toxic Lake illustrates that the failure to prevent the environmental destruction of Onondaga Lake was part of a political climate which favored unregulated industrial production and urban growth, ignoring the destructive impacts on local environments. Shevory argues this larger failure was the result of an active process of privileging the economic interests of polluters over other business interests, expanding neighborhoods, and indigenous rights. He concludes with an investigation of New York’s recent declaration that the clean-up is complete, questioning what exactly that means and whether the lake’s status as a sacred space will ever be re-established. Toxic Lake is a compelling work of history, demonstrating the disastrous effects of pollution and the importance of community involvement in environmental activism.

GIS for Science, Volume 3: Maps for Saving the Planet, highlights real-world examples of scientists creating maps about saving life on Earth and preserving biodiversity.   

With Earth and the natural world at risk from various forces, geographic information system (GIS) mapping is essential for driving scientifically conscious decision-making about how to protect life on Earth. In volume 3 of GIS for Science, explore a collection of maps from scientists working to save the planet through documenting and protecting its biodiversity.  

In this volume, learn how GIS and data mapping are used in tandem with 

• global satellite observation
• forestry
• marine policy
• artificial intelligence
• conservation biology, and
• environmental education

to help preserve and chronicle life on Earth. This volume also spotlights important global action initiatives incorporating conservation, including Half-Earth, 30 x 30, AI for Earth, the Blue Nature Alliance, and the Sustainable Development Solutions Network. 

The stories presented in this third volume are ideal for the professional scientist and conservationist and anyone interested in the intersection of technology and the conservation of nature. The book’s contributors include scientists who are applying geographic data gathered from the full spectrum of remote sensing and on-site technologies. The maps and data are brought to life using ArcGIS® software and other spatial data science tools that support research, collaboration, spatial analysis, and science communication across many locations and within diverse communities. The stories shared in this book and its companion website present inspirational ideas so that GIS users and scientists can work toward preserving biodiversity and saving planet Earth before time runs out. 

Explores ecological socialism's potential against capitalist environmental degradation

Today the fate of the earth as a home for humanity is in question—and yet, contends John Bellamy Foster, the reunification of humanity and the earth remains possible if we are prepared to make revolutionary changes. As with his prior books, The Dialectics of Ecology is grounded in the contention that we are now faced with a concrete choice between ecological socialism and capitalist exterminism, and rooted in insights drawn from the classical historical materialist tradition. In this latest work, Foster explores the complex theoretical debates that have arisen historically with respect to the dialectics of nature and society. He then goes on to examine the current contradictions associated with the confrontation between capitalist extractivism and the financialization of nature, on the one hand, and the radical challenges to these represented by emergent visions of ecological civilization and planned degrowth, on the other.

The product of contemporary ecosocialist debates, The Dialectics of Ecology builds on earlier works by Foster, including Marx’s Ecology and The Return of Nature, aimed at the development of a dialectical naturalism and the formation of a path to sustainable human development.

The story of how Africa’s mammals have helped shape the continent’s landscapes over time to support an amazing diversity of life

Africa is home to an amazing array of animals, including the world’s most diverse assortment of large mammals. These include the world’s largest terrestrial mammal, the African elephant, which still roams great swathes of the continent alongside a host of other well-known large mammals with hooves such as hippopotamuses, giraffes, rhinoceroses, and zebras. African Ark: Mammals, Landscape and the Ecology of a Continent tells the story of where these mammals have come from and how they have interacted to create the richly varied landscape that makes up Africa as we know it today. It gives an equal airing to small mammals, such as rodents and bats, which are often overlooked by both naturalists and zoologists in favor of their larger cousins.

African Ark not only describes the diversity of African mammals and the habitats in which they live; it also explains the processes by which species and population groups are formed and how these fluctuate over time. A book on mammals would not be complete without attention placed on the impact of megafauna on the environment and the important roles they play in shaping the landscape. In this way, mammals such as elephants and rhinoceros support countless plant communities and the habitats of many smaller animals.

The book brings in a human perspective as well as a conservation angle in its assessment of the interaction of African mammals with the people who live alongside them. African Ark is at once scientifically rigorous and accessible for the layperson and student alike, while drawing on the contributions of numerous zoologists, ecologists and conservationists dedicated to the understanding of Africa and its wildlife.

An all-access guide to the abundant natural splendor of Sonoma County.

Wild Sonoma celebrates the spectacular and resilient natural landscapes of Sonoma County, which along with its neighboring counties is one of the world’s premier winegrowing regions.  Our exploration launches with an entertaining primer on ecology basics, including the impact of fire, before a fun fact–filled survey of sixty-two of the area’s iconic and commonly encountered species—from vivacious acorn woodpeckers to disease-neutralizing Western fence lizards. It caps off with a tour of six sites to experience Sonoma’s diverse natural beauty, with a special emphasis on access. Written by Wild LA author Charles Hood, introduced by renowned naturalist Jane Goodall, and illustrated by John Muir Laws, Wild Sonoma offers residents and tourists from eight to eighty a sense of wonder and cause for hope.

In this groundbreaking and meticulously field-tested guide, the rich variety of Sierra life—trees, wildflowers, ferns, fungi, lichens, fish, reptiles, amphibians, birds, mammals, and insects—comes alive.

"There are lots of Sierra field guides, some specialized, some general, but this is the best both for beauty and usefulness." —Kim Stanley Robinson

Easy-to-use features include:

• Intuitive organization, color tabs, and simple keys
• Similar-looking species side by side
• Over 2,800 full-color illustrations
• Range maps of species that are otherwise difficult to distinguish
• Index of common and scientific names
• Lightweight and compact—ideal for backpacking

Impressively detailed and comprehensive, the guide includes:

• More than 1,700 species
• Descriptions of behavior, adaptations, and interactions between species
• Species and topics not found in most guides, including aquatic life, spiders and webs, plankton, plant galls, bark beetle galleries, animal tracks and evidence, seasonal star charts, weather patterns, and cloud formations

Inhabiting a landscape, walking a landscape, writing a place and time.

Linda Cracknell is a writer of place and nature who believes in being alert, observing, and writing from the particulars of each experience. Engaging bodily with her writing, she is someone for whom getting mud on her boots, sleeping high up in the hills, or being slapped by salt water can all be part of her process. She follows Susan Sontag's advice to “Love words, agonize over sentences and pay attention to the world.”

In this varied collection of essays, Linda backpacks on a small island that is connected to the mainland at low tide, musing on the nineteenth-century Scottish writer whose character was shipwrecked there. She hikes the wooded mountain trail close to her home in winter snow—a place she is intimately familiar with in all weathers and seasons—and she retraces the steps of a multiday hike made almost seven decades after her parents trod the route together. She explores her inspirations, in nature and from other artists and their work.

Reading this collection will open your eyes to the world around you and how you can observe, take note, and later commit those notes and memories to written pieces that will evoke the place and time.

Social changes through urban gardening and farming

Gardens are often spaces of hope, expected to solve many problems in a city including food insecurity and climate resilience. In fact, there has been a historical trend of urban gardening gaining popularity during times of crisis. Gardens of Hope is the story of urban gardening in New Orleans in the decade after Hurricane Katrina. Yuki Kato highlights the impact urban gardens have on communities after disasters and the efforts of well-intended individuals envisioning alternative futures in the form of urban farming.

Drawing on repeated interviews with residents who began cultivation projects in New Orleans between 2005 and 2015, Kato explains how good intentions and grit were not enough to implement or sustain urban gardeners’ visions for the post-disaster city’s future. Coining the term “prefigurative urbanism,” Kato illustrates how individuals tried to realize alternative ways of living and working in the city through pragmatism and innovation. Gardens of Hope asks key questions about what inspires and enables individuals to pursue prefigurative urbanism and about the potential and limitations of this form of civic engagement to bring about short- and long-term changes in cities undergoing transformation, from gentrification, post-pandemic recovery, to climate change.

United Methodist Women’s Reading Group Selection

“What can I do about the environment? What has God said about the environment?” Most books about climate change only address one of these questions. Those from a religious perspective do not address what individuals can do to help society transition from fossil fuels, other than changing personal behavior. Readers know instinctively that will not suffice, and so are left feeling the situation is hopeless. In contrast, books that primarily address environmental issues fail to reach people motivated more by faith than science, leaving out many who could constitute the tipping point for full American engagement on the issue.

Borrowing an approach from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s leadership, which brought together both secular and religious arguments for ending segregation, this book addresses physical evidence of climate change while demonstrating through biblical teachings the religious imperative for preserving our inherited world. The compelling biblical case for creation care is grounded in environmental teachings Jesus knew, primarily in the Hebrew Scriptures. Topics addressed include air pollution, treatment of the land, preserving biological diversity, and treatment of animals, and each is connected to contemporary issues such as greenhouse gas emissions, care of the needy, the extinction of species, and factory farming.

Western culture is infatuated with the dream of going beyond, even as it is increasingly haunted by the specter of apocalypse: drought, famine, nuclear winter. How did we come to think of the planet and its limits as we do? This book reclaims, redefines, and makes an impassioned plea for limits—a notion central to environmentalism—clearing them from their association with Malthusianism and the ideology and politics that go along with it. Giorgos Kallis rereads reverend-economist Thomas Robert Malthus and his legacy, separating limits and scarcity, two notions that have long been conflated in both environmental and economic thought. Limits are not something out there, a property of nature to be deciphered by scientists, but a choice that confronts us, one that, paradoxically, is part and parcel of the pursuit of freedom. Taking us from ancient Greece to Malthus, from hunter-gatherers to the Romantics, from anarchist feminists to 1970s radical environmentalists, Limits shows us how an institutionalized culture of sharing can make possible the collective self-limitation we so urgently need.

A fascinating history of the carbon footprint of our concrete world—from ancient Roman architecture to urban cityscapes—and the trouble it spells for sustainability amidst rapid climate change

For readers of The Sixth Extinction and The Uninhabitable Earth, Concrete explores the history of a material that has been central to architecture and design for thousands of years—and what its future looks like in a world experiencing rapid climate change.

Imagine what the world would be like without concrete: there’d be no high-rises, no grand irrigation projects, no lettuce from southern climes in the winter, no multi-lane highways crisscrossing continents, a shortage of electricity, more mud in some places, more solitude in others. But because of the fossil fuels and other resources required to make concrete, there also would be less CO2 in the atmosphere and less dramatic climate change. In Concrete: From Ancient Origins to a Problematic Future, Soderstrom tells the story of concrete’s glorious past, extravagant present, and uncertain future with careful research, lively anecdotes, and thoughtful reflection. The framework for this exploration is one the Romans—famous for concrete structures that are still strong—would understand: the four elements of Earth, Fire, Water, and Air.

Discover the geographic approach to conservation land management and landscape conservation. 

Geographic information system (GIS) technology offers a comprehensive tool for conservation professionals. A modern GIS gives users a real-time look at their data, locations, and their relationships. When applied to conservation, it reveals dependencies and challenges across multiple environments. Through maps and apps, conservation professionals can observe the field, analyze and organize their data, and collaborate with other organizations and the public on addressing threats and opportunities found. Preserving Our Planet: GIS for Conservation explores a collection of real-life stories about conservation organizations successfully using GIS to meet challenges to biodiversity preservation in our rapidly changing world.

The book also includes a section on next steps that provides ideas, strategies, tools, and actions to help you jump-start your own use of GIS for conservation. A collection of online resources, including additional stories, videos, new ideas and concepts, and downloadable tools and content, complements this book.

Edited by David Gadsden, director of conservation solutions at Esri, and Matt Artz, an Esri content strategist. 

Indigenous Peoples of the North American Plains were ecologists of the highest order— then the horse came and changed everything

Beaver, Bison, Horse is an interdisciplinary account of the ecological relationships the Indigenous nations of the Plains had to the beaver, bison, horse, and their habitat prior to contact. Morgan’s research shows an ecological understanding that sustained Indigenous peoples for thousands of years, with critical information on how the beaver manage water systems and protect communities from drought in the Northern Great Plains.

Morgan’s work is a game-changer.

For the first time in print, her important research now appears with a foreword by James Daschuk, bestselling and award-winning author of Clearing the Plains, and an afterword by Cristina Eisenberg, author of The Carnivore Way and The Wolf’s Tooth.

• A larger, more reader-friendly page format
• More than 110 color illustrations and maps
• An overview of major wildfires in California's history
• An updated and expanded discussion of the effect of climate change on fires in natural landscapes
• Tips on what to do before, during, and after fires
• Discussion of utility companies and massive power shutoffs

“Whether you are an experienced birder or just learning natural history, this book will deepen your sense of place and open insights to beauty, wonder, and connection to the natural world.”—John Muir Laws, author of The Laws Field Guide to the Sierra Nevada

The essential field guide to the birds of Egypt and the Middle East by a leading naturalist, stunningly illustrated with full-color photography

This compact, incisive photographic identification guide to 280 bird species in Egypt and the Middle East shows the region’s most commonly seen, unique, and endemic species, and is perfect for resident and visitor alike. Each bird species is illustrated with a high-quality full-color photograph, accompanied by a detailed description, which includes nomenclature, size, distribution, habits, and habitat. The user-friendly introduction covers biogeography, migration, bird topography, and a glossary. Also included is an all-important checklist of all of the birds of Egypt encompassing, for each species, its common and scientific name as well as its status in each country and its global International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) status.