Islands in Space and Time Book

David G. Campbell turns an ecologist's keen eye on ten beautiful but endangered wilderness areas across the globe. He travels to the island of Moloka'i, where remnants of the true Hawaii can still be found; to Ecuador's remote, mountainous Cayambe Coca reserve; to a bay in Brazil that preserves a fragment of the once vast coastal forest; to the Flying D Ranch in Montana, where 3,300 bison roam the recovering grasslands; to the Everglades and tiny Lignumvitae Key in Florida; even to the coral reefs and secret lakes of the Rock Islands of Palau in Micronesia. Campbell brings back vivid portraits of places where the rich natural mosaic of species is being preserved against great odds. He accompanies Ache tribesmen in Paraguay on an armadillo hunt, observes flamingos mating in Yucatan, listens to the wild cries of howler monkeys in Belize, and everywhere finds a diversity of interconnected life forms. At the same time, he reminds us of the fragility of these refuges, their vulnerability to introduced plant and animal species and to modern practices of agriculture and industry.