Tracking and the Art of Seeing: How to Read Animal Tracks and Sign - Softcover

Rezendes, Paul

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0062735241 ISBN 13: 9780062735249

Publisher: Collins Reference, 1999

Synopsis

In this newly revised and updated edition of his highly acclaimed field guide, renowned nature photographer and tracking expert Paul Rezendes brings the fields and forests to life with his unique observations on North American wildlife and their tracks and sign. Illustrated with hundreds of his original photographs, Tracking & the Art of Seeing provides complete information on the behavior and habitat of over 50 animal species and shows you how to identify animals by their tracks, tail patterns, droppings, dens, scratches and other signs.

About this title

Review:

A good observer of nature, walking, say, in an oak forest, may discern that some of the acorns on which he or she is treading are broken into little bits. After reading wildlife interpreter and photographer Paul Rezendes's guidebook to animal signs, that same observer will be able to tell which of those acorns have been split by human footsteps and deer hooves and which have been gnawed apart by squirrels--and by what species of squirrel. A wonderfully thorough, well-illustrated compendium, Rezendes's text covers a wide range of North American animal species, including rodents, hoofed animals, bears, raccoons, opossums, and members of the weasel, rabbit, dog, and cat families. He describes not only the signs these animals leave but also their ways of life throughout the year, and with an appropriately environmentalist purpose. "Ultimately," Rezendes writes, "tracking an animal makes us sensitive to it--a bond is formed, an intimacy develops. We begin to realize that what is happening to the animals and to the planet is actually happening to us." He's right, of course, but one need not take such a macrocosmic view of nature to take pleasure in, and learn from, this fine book. --Gregory McNamee

About the Author:

Paul Rezendes is an internationally recognized photographer, tracked, and wildlife consultant whose work has appeared in numerous books and magazines, including his photography book Wetlands: The Web of Life. The author of The Wild Within, he lives in Athol, Massachusetts.

About this edition

• Publisher: Collins Reference
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0062735241
• ISBN 13: 9780062735249
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 336