Reviews for The biology and conservation of wild canids

The average rating for The biology and conservation of wild canids based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2015-11-20 00:00:00 Amy Jensen This book aims to be a synthetic overview of wild canidae, covering various topics from canid social behavior to wildlife management. It begins in Part I with an overview of the extant wild canid species, grouped according to the most common taxonomy (with 36 species), followed by review articles on canid ancestry/evolution, population genetics, society, management, infectious disease, and "tools," which is about conservation tools, such as public outreach strategies. Part II consists of case studies involving each species. Generally speaking, the articles are of very high quality, as expected from Oxford's biology series. While some of the discussion could be a bit overly schematic or somewhat misleadingly simplified - in the population genetics chapter, for example - this can usually be attributed to the constraints of writing for an audience which does not entirely or even necessarily primarily consist of research ecologists, evolutionary biologists, etc. The book is also very clearly somewhat slanted somewhat towards conservation/management, and behavior. Overall, the discussion is at an excellent intermediate level, perfect for scientists from other specialties or disciplines (like me) or general readers who are too advanced for most pop science books but want some grounding before they delve further into the literature. What holds me back from giving the book a strongly positive review is not the quality of the contributions taken in isolation, but the editorial strategy. I frankly did not like the "case studies" approach. While the case studies were intrinsically interesting, they felt relatively scattershot and un-integrated; I thought the book would've been much better served by in-depth review articles for each species, to the extent possible. Case study references could then be included in end-of-chapter "further reading." I also thought that, while the review articles were excellent, the coverage was very uneven; since the book purports to be a synthetic overview, I would've liked to see a lot more material on things like anatomy, or much more about the ecology of canidae beyond social behavior, disease, and management. For example, a chapter about how canidae, and predators in general, regulate community structure. There is some excellent content in this book to be sure, I learned a lot reading it, and I think the biologist, conservationist, or wildlife enthusiast would not be wasting their money getting this on their shelves, but I don't think it succeeds at its central mission of providing a synthetic overview of general canid biology.

Review # 2 was written on 2015-07-22 00:00:00 Mark Newberger It is a wonderfully thought provoking book. Easy to read, very clear writing, and incredibly well referenced. The extensive footnotes at the end of each chapter were just as rewarding as the chapter itself. The book is a study of literary influence, using the Inklings as a case study. There has (evidentially) been a great deal of denial over the mutual influence of the Inklings on any particular member's particular work. First, the author goes through the four previously defined types of literary influence (Someone else's seminal work defined these 4 types, our author uses that as a frame, and then adds a fifth type) and shows how the Inklings provided that particular role for each other; second, she puzzles out why literary influence should be such an inflammatory topic. Following that is an appendix giving a brief biographical sketch of each Inkling, and even the Appendix is excellent. It was clear, well organized, well written, thought provoking, extraordinarily well referenced .. my only complaint is that her second section was so short. For anyone fascinated by literary influence theory or Inkling studies. I'll be re-reading this book.