Largest of all beasts that dwell on land, elephants can uproot trees or topple the huts of a village. They have the power to communicate in a language of subsonic frequencies, snorkel across the open sea between islands, care for their wounded and mourn their dead. Asian elephants were domesticated more than 4,000 years ago and, like their African cousins (whose numbers have been halved each decade since the 1970s), they face extinction through an over-whelming loss of habitat. In this book, Douglas Chadwick provides a ...
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Largest of all beasts that dwell on land, elephants can uproot trees or topple the huts of a village. They have the power to communicate in a language of subsonic frequencies, snorkel across the open sea between islands, care for their wounded and mourn their dead. Asian elephants were domesticated more than 4,000 years ago and, like their African cousins (whose numbers have been halved each decade since the 1970s), they face extinction through an over-whelming loss of habitat. In this book, Douglas Chadwick provides a comprehensive exploration of the natural history and modern fate of the world's elephants, centred around the theme that "we are discovering a creature greater in many ways - and more like us - than we had ever imagined it to be even as we are destroying it." The book blends field biology with personal observation. It looks behind the headlines, he covers the "ivory wars" in East Africa and elsewhere.
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Seller's Description:
Very Good in Good Plus jacket. 8vo. xi, 492pp, selected bibliography, index. Prev owner's book stamp by the upper edge of the front flyleaf. Cloth-backed papered boards in edge-worn dust-jacket which has some loss at its extremities. The author looks at the troubled fate of both the African and Asian species of elephant. He visits India, Siberia, Botswana, Thailand, Malaysia, Kenya, and even an American zoo, illustrating the role the elephant plays in shaping and balancing not only the ecosystems it calls home, but also the livelihoods of a wide array of people. In each place visited, the author reveals the elephant as a playful, intelligent being, full of surprises.
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Seller's Description:
Very good in fair jacket. 24 cm, 492 pages. DJ worn with tear at spine. Signed (twice) by the author. Social behavior of the elephant including mourning the dead, and caring forthe sick and elderly, their use of subsonic sound to communicate over distance, and their ability in captivity to respond to over 60 different commands.
