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The image of salmon battling upstream through whitewater cataracts to spawn in their birthplace is integral to any happy vision of the Pacific Northwest. Sadly, because they face more insidious obstacles than swift currents, few people today actually witness this remarkable spectacle. Armed with exhaustive research and an ability to synthesize his findings into a concise, readable indictment of the status quo, Jim Lichatowich, a fisheries scientist for 30 years, traces the sudden decline of Northwest salmon populations following the onset of Euro-American settlement. He points a finger at the usual suspects: logging, mining, damming, grazing, irrigation, commercial fishing, and development. Moreover, he cites the political establishment for a failure of nerve. Since the shift from a Native American "gift" economy based on sustainability to a profit economy based on self-interest and short-term financial gain, the historically resilient salmon have met one adversary after another, with little or no help from the legal apparatus charged with their protection. In fact, federal and state governments have responded to the deepening crisis mainly by building fish hatcheries up and down the West Coast. Contrary to the beliefs of entrenched bureaucrats and sport fishermen, says Lichatowich, hatcheries have merely diluted the gene pools of wild stocks while allowing resource extractors to continue their multifarious operations and politicians to shirk their responsibilities. In 1960, for instance, after decades of declining runs, the Washington Department of Fisheries reported, incredibly (and characteristically), that new advanced management techniques would soon result in "salmon without a river"--more welcome news to those who would continue to exploit these iconic fish and their habitat. At the dawn of the 21st century hundreds of hatcheries still operate, yet Northwest salmon populations have decreased 95 percent.
Lichatowich is a learned and persuasive advocate for wild salmon. He's also eloquent, as in this description of his first visit to the Columbia River's Grand Coulee dam:
As I sat there wondering and swatting mosquitoes, the face of the dam lit up. It was the start of the nightly laser show.... Appropriately, the lasers sent a series of large green dollar signs floating through the darkness. Then a series of laser salmon swam across the face of the dam. Here were the ideal salmon, I thought, the fish that fit perfectly into our worldview. We have complete control over them--press a button and they appear; press another and they change from green to red; press another and they swim over the dam. Salmon and dams are compatible--as long as you are not particular about the kind of salmon.
So what to do? Lichatowich opines that we need a new "worldview," one that places natural resources within a context of respect and sustainability. He looks to state and federal governments to enforce the protections already granted by laws like the Endangered Species Act. And he sees evidence that public perceptions may be changing on such issues as habitat conservation and biodiversity; breaching four dams on the lower Snake River to aid fish passage would have been unthinkable even in the early 1990s. Whether this new worldview can save salmon in time is another question. --Langdon Cook
Book Description
"Fundamentally, the salmon's decline has been the consequence of a vision based on flawed assumptions and unchallenged myths.... We assumed we could control the biological productivity of salmon and 'improve' upon natural processes that we didn't even try to understand. We assumed we could have salmon without rivers." --from the introduction
From a mountain top where an eagle carries a salmon carcass to feed its young to the distant oceanic waters of the California current and the Alaskan Gyre, salmon have penetrated the Northwest to an extent unmatched by any other animal. Since the turn of the twentieth century, the natural productivity of salmon in Oregon, Washington, California, and Idaho has declined by eighty percent. The decline of Pacific salmon to the brink of extinction is a clear sign of serious problems in the region.
In Salmon Without Rivers, fisheries biologist Jim Lichatowich offers an eye-opening look at the roots and evolution of the salmon crisis in the Pacific Northwest. He describes the multitude of factors over the past century and a half that have led to the salmon's decline, and examines in depth the abject failure of restoration efforts that have focused almost exclusively on hatcheries to return salmon stocks to healthy levels without addressing the underlying causes of the decline. The book:
- describes the evolutionary history of the salmon along with the geologic history of the Pacific Northwest over the past 40 million years
- considers the indigenous cultures of the region, and the emergence of salmon-based economies that survived for thousands of years
- examines the rapid transformation of the region following the arrival of Europeans
- presents the history of efforts to protect and restore the salmon
- offers a critical assessment of why restoration efforts have failed
Throughout, Lichatowich argues that the dominant worldview of our society -- a worldview that denies connections between humans and the natural world -- has created the conflict and controversy that characterize the recent history of salmon; unless that worldview is challenged and changed, there is little hope for recovery. Salmon Without Rivers exposes the myths that have guided recent human-salmon interactions. It clearly explains the difficult choices facing the citizens of the region, and provides unique insight into one of the most tragic chapters in our nation's environmental history.
Customer Reviews:
Peter Morrison.......2005-09-11
This is a must read book for anyone interested in salmon, rivers and the ecology and history of the Pacific Northwest. Excellent information and a good read.
Great read.......2005-08-02
This is an excellent book that documents the history of salmon, how native Americans viewed them and how modern Americans view them. It focuses on why the pacific northwest is facing a salmon crisis, and our failed attempts to replace what we have lost. Great read for anyone who is concerned about environmental issues.
Pacific Northwest Salmon History Book.......2003-12-02
Salmon Without Rivers is a great book of historical facts. It includes many issues like; original salmon locations/populations, "Economy over Environment" issues, and the ineffectiveness of large decision making commissions/agencies. However, with all his good background information the book does not propose any solutions nor investigates today's coastal human communities as they relate to the salmon and/or habitat.
A captivating, human, informed book.......2001-01-16
As a freelance author writing a piece about salmon for a California-based magazine, this book was indispensible and eye-opening. It is unfailingly sensitive and intelligent about salmon, discussing the fish as fellow creatures in the "natural economy" in which we all live, rather than as mere commodities in the "industrial economy" that has transformed the West in the last 150 years. It is fascinating about the geology that shaped the salmon's environment, the evolutionary history of the fish, the relationship between Native Americans and salmon in the Northwest, and it provides a detailed history of the many factors that have led to the salmon's decline, including habitat destruction, misbegotten hatchery programs, overfishing, dams, mining, grazing, irrigation. If you like to read books about ecology, the creatures of the earth, fish, or the Northwest--you can't go wrong. This is a wonderful book.
Save the salmon and us.......2000-12-24
A thoroughly researched and impassioned presentation including the history of salmon, their decline, why billions of tax dollars in restoration efforts have had paltry returns, and insights into the where we should go from here. A complex issue is examined from many perspectives in an easy to read and compelling book. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in salmon.
Book Description
Whether you are planting a yard from scratch or modifying an existing area, LANDSCAPING FOR WILDLIFE IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST will help you select, arrange, and maintain plants and other landscape elements that fulfill wildlife needs. Homeowners, property owners, professional wildlife managers, landscape architects, and garden designers will all find it invaluable
Nearly 100 illustrations of common Pacific Northwest wildlife enhance the text which includes a wealth of information on the following topics:
Wildlife habitat and landscaping basics
Birds, mamals, reptiles, amphibians, and insects likely to be attracted to your property
Specialty gardens for butterflies and hummingbirds
How to plant and maintain woodlands, grasslands, wetlands, and waterways
Feeders and nest boxes
Ponds and birdbaths
Potential problems
Wildlife viewing tips
Extensive plant lists
Customer Reviews:
A great book to give away to friends and relatives!.......2006-09-02
This is my 4th or 5th purchase of this wonderful book. I have given all my copies away and need another for myself. It has great resources on the plants birds, insects and animals use for food, cover, etc. We made our voilet green swallow nest boxes from the plans in the book. We've watched new swallows peek out and take their first flight every year since we put them up.
We live in the foothills of Mt. Hood and it took me a few months after moving here to realize I shouldn't bring the invasive plants I used in town to the mountains. And I realized I could have turned my city home into a wildlife haven. The book is a great resources for all city, suburb or rural locales in the PNW.
It's just a wonderful book!
more than just the Pacific Northwest.......2000-08-31
We live in Southern California so I was a bit dubious how useful this book would be. Happily, it still has much to offer for anyone wishing to wildscape. There's plenty of general advice re. food/water/nesting sites etc. and good plans for bird houses and bat houses. There's a nice chapter on attracting hummingbirds and butterflies, and plenty about creating and maintaining water features (a huge attraction for wildlife in hot areas like ours).
You will need to cross reference the plant lists against what's native for your area, and find your own local native plant nurseries, but there's still lots of great advice here for wildlife gardeners that can be adapted to almost any region.
Trish
The Best Landscaping for Wildlife Book.......2000-03-23
Link, Russell, Landscaping for Wildlife in the Pacific Northwest, University of Washington Press, Seattle, 1999, 320p.
Soft cover, perfect binding, acid free paper, 8.5 X 11.
The book is divided into 5 parts 1) Wildlife Habitat Design and Maintenance 2) Pacific Northwest Wildlife in the Landscape 3) Special Features for Wildlife Landscapes 4) Coexisting with Wildlife 5) Appendices
Volume has good index , bibliographic references and is clearly printed.
Over one third of the book is in the Appendices, they are excellent, perhaps its best `part'.
A) Pacific Northwest Habitats B) Wildlife Plants Lists, Tables, and Maps C) Landscape and Wildlife Information for Specific Plants D) Construction Plans for Nest Boxes and Bird Feeders E) Resources (in my opinion, very important)
Content:
Well written, educationally enhanced by wonderful illustrations, good examples and step-by-step procedures. Quality, abet small, section of color photos of wildlife identification and descriptions. Includes description of habitat construction from apartment balcony to acreage. Also discusses ponds, dust paths, nest boxes and nest structures, feeders with detailed tables, brush piles, snags, hedgerows, bird watching, problems with wildlife and responsible pet ownership.
Book can be read as text or used as a reference resource. The publication is a must for any land steward or wildlife enthusiast. An excellent purchase as a gift for yourself or fellow enthusiast. Available in bookstores or if you order from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife you receive a copy autographed by Russell.
Average customer rating:
- Great introduction to the ecology of the Northwest Coast
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The Northwest Coast: A Natural History
Stewart T. Schultz
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Seashore Life of the Northern Pacific Coast: An Illustrated Guide to Northern California, Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia
ASIN: 0881921424 |
Customer Reviews:
Great introduction to the ecology of the Northwest Coast.......2007-07-17
I am not a specialist, but I have enjoyed this book very much. The author takes an holistic approach to the subject, starting with how geological history and climate shape the environment and the biological communities that live in it. The book is full of fascinating facts, from the sexual life of gray whales to which species are prevalent in intertidal zones, to how much seafood sea mammals consume. The book complements a field guide (it does not help much in identification, by itself): it explains and enables you to see what is going on in front of your eyes. I think it adds a lot to the enjoyment I can derive from visiting the coast. By the way, in spite of the title, the California coast is described here, and so is the Canadian one.
Book Description
Winner of the George Perkins Marsh Award, American Society for Environmental History
Customer Reviews:
Making Salmon Makes Us Human.......2003-01-03
There's your text books on salmon, and there's required reading.
Of the 300-odd salmon titles, Making Salmon is one of those you
must read. Like First Fish, First People, Making Salmon is about
the human side of the fishery, its evolution and confabulation
as a fought-over resource. Absolutely fascinating history, you
realize right away that nobody has an absolute moral high ground
in the salmon debate. Everything is allied against its survival,
and yet magically, miraculously, the salmon continue to return.
Like Mountain in the Clouds, put Making Salmon on your booklist.
Understates negative impact of logging.......2001-11-06
Mr. Taylor accurately identifies most of the causes of the salmon population crisis facing Washington state, Oregon, Alaska, and British Columbia. And he is dead on in his assessment of the impact of farm fisheries on salmon ecology.
The book grossly understates, however, the impact of logging on salmon habitat. Without canopy to cool streams, temperature-sensitive salmon simply cannot spawn successfully. And let's not overlook the role that clear-cutting plays in causing erosion, sedimentation, and flooding. It's true that salmon ecology can still suffer from genetic contamination by farm fish, point-source and non-point-source pollution, illegal overfishing on the high seas, legal overfishing in fresh water, damming, and overuse of water by irrigators and developers. But let's not downplay the egregious impact of logging.
Swimming Against the Current.......2000-05-11
Making Salmon is the definitive work on the problems facing the salmon fishery of the Pacific Northwest. For as long as man has lived he has exploited the salmon. Joseph Taylor takes the reader on a journey through time as he leads us step by step through the decline of these once great fish. There is plenty of culpability to go around. Foresters, developers, commercial fisherman, native Americans, even sport fishermen all come in for their share of blame. Although focusing on Oregon, Taylor's work is easily transferable anywhere salmon swim, from Alaska to California.
Extremely well documented (fully a third of the book is taken up with notes and other addenda) Making Salmon is occasionally dry but never dull. What is most dramatic about this story is the resiliency of the salmon. Time and time again they manage to survive despite our best efforts to save them!
Regardless of where you stand on the issue of dams, hatcheries, consumption or conservation, you will find merit in this work. Making Salmon is a must read for anyone interested in the rivers and fisheries of the Northwest.
Swimming Against the Current.......2000-03-30
As long as man has lived in the Pacific Northwest he has exploited the salmon. In this thorough history of the travails of the pacific salmon, Joseph Taylor does not hesitate to mince words or point the finger of blame, and there is plenty of blame to go around. Native Americans, commercial fishermen, loggers, farmers, sport fishermen, politicians, the states, the feds, the hatcheries, and others, all share the responsibility for the decline of these great fish.
Although focusing on Oregon, MAKING SALMON is easily transferable anywhere Pacific salmon exist, from California to Alaska. Extremely well documented, (fully a third of the book is taken up with notes and other addenda) MAKING SALMON takes the reader step by step through the last two centuries of development in the Northwest and what that has meant to the salmon fishery there. Taylor paints an excellent history of failure and simplistic answers to a complex problem. What comes through, as most intriguing, is the resiliency of the salmon. They somehow manage to survive despite our best efforts to save them. Resiliency should not be confused with immortality however.
Not always an easy read, MAKING SALMON nonetheless remains essential to anyone wishing to better understand the plight of the Pacific salmon or who is interested in the fine detail of what happens when man and nature collide.
The definitive history of the Northwest salmon crisis.......2000-02-06
Joseph Taylor's award-winning history of the Northwest salmon crisis is the best book to date on this important topic. No other study is as well researched or beautifully written as MAKING SALMON. Taylor, who teaches environmental and Western United States history at Iowa State University, traces the historical decline of salmon runs throughout the Pacific Northwest, focusing primarily on Oregon. His argument--that while many have claimed to speak for salmon, most have actually articulated their own needs instead--takes the current debate beyond the politics of blame. Understanding the complex social and environmental history of the "salmon crisis," he argues, is essential to thinking more clearly about the future of our region's fisheries. Most impressive is his critique of the role hatcheries have played in diminishing Northwest salmon runs. Science and technology, he concludes, have not always saved nature from human abuses. Abundant illustrations, detailed maps, and a rich bibliography round out the book. There are many titles that explore the decline of salmon in the Pacific Northwest. None address the issue as artfully and intelligently as MAKING SALMON. It is required reading for anyone who cares about the future of Northwest salmon or the people who depend upon them.
Customer Reviews:
There's more to marine life than learning its name!.......2006-12-28
Kozloff's book is a classic and a bible for anyone who studies intertidal and coastal organisms in the Pacific Northwest. Professor Sean used this book when he took Kozloff's Marine Biology class at the University of Washington and it has been one of his favorites ever since. Kozloff's insights and anecdotes on marine organisms, accompanied by his encyclopedic knowledge, blend to create an outstanding book for identifying and learning more about marine life. If you simply want to know the names of the organisms, there are plenty of cheap field books out there. But if you want to truly know and understand marine organisms and the role they play in the ocean, then this is the book for you.
Not for you if you just want to know "what is this?".......2003-04-25
This book is really geared more toward the academic. I would not find it useful as a field guide, though it makes for fairly interesting biological reading. It is not laid out in a "field guide" fashion, with species listed and illustrations for each provided. It would be frustrating to take the kids to the beach at low tide and attempt to use this unless you are very well acquainted with your marine taxonomy. Most species are not identified by a common name, and the color plates and illustrations are not necessarily near the species text.
This book reads as a textbook for students rather than a useful tool for laymen who just need to know what critter they just found under a rock, and want the information before the tide comes back in.
A great guide for someone who wants to see for themselves.......1999-05-19
Though published in the early 1980s, this book does a wonderful job of introducing the active naturalist to the nearshore marine life of the Pacific Northwest. This book includes good illustrations and photographs, descriptions of where marine flora and fauna live and what they do there. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to go the seashore of the Pacific Northwest and figure out what they are looking at. Kozloff has been there and seen everything he's writing about. I use this book as my primary text when I take students to Puget Sound, Washington, for my marine ecology field course. A top notch field guide!
Average customer rating:
- A must when hiking the West Coast Trail
- A great handbook for scuba divers and tidepool explorers
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Tidepool and Reef Marine Life Guide to the Pacific Northwest Coast: Marinelife Guide to the Pacific Northwest Coast
Rick Harbo
Manufacturer: Hancock House Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 0888390394 |
Customer Reviews:
A must when hiking the West Coast Trail.......2004-12-02
I attended a UofC Outdoor Centre slideshow on hiking the West Coast Trail. The presenter had hiked the trail 11 times, and highly recomended this book. He said the only place you could find it was on the ferry (?). There are several editions ('80, '89, '94) and I don't know the difference. Make sure the copy you get has waterproof pages (I'm unsure about the early editions!).
A great handbook for scuba divers and tidepool explorers.......2000-01-25
This is an excellent guidebook, which unlike most, doesn't contain aquarium shots, stock photos and retouched photos. If you want a handy easy to read book which covers 99% of the typical sealife you'll find in the Pacific Northwest - this is it!
Book Description
From the interactive clockwork world of geology, tides, Northwest weather, and snow, to the hidden roles of dirt, stream life, and mosses and lichens, Pulitzer Prize winning writer William Dietrich explores the natural splendors of the Pacific Northwest. His topics include alder and cedar; jellyfish, geoducks, crabs, and killer whales; mosquitoes and spiders; gulls, crows, raccoons, possums, deer, and cougars.
This informative and engaging selection of natural history essays is adapted from articles published in the Seattle Times magazine, Pacific Northwest. A native Washingtonian, Dietrich has watched the Northwest double in population during his lifetime. Our rapidly changing view of nature is an underlying theme throughout his wide-ranging essays, as is the timely and essential question of how best to share and conserve the natural world that drew us to the region in the first place.
Neither a field guide nor an environmental policy book, Natural Grace is intended as a primer for people who are curious about the environment they live in and the pressures upon it. "We only care about what we know," says the author. "I've concluded that enthusiasm and commitment begin from learning just how marvelous this region is: Passion has to precede purpose." And there is much to marvel over. Dietrich has unearthed fascinating and unexpected facts about his subjects, and he has a gift for expressing complex information in clear and vivid language. He asks intriguing questions and makes good use of interviews with Northwest scientists and experts to convey current and historic attitudes and economic realities, and to consider where we go from here.
Customer Reviews:
This is a wonderful book........2007-07-19
If you are interested in becoming better acquainted with the flora, fauna, and other natural features of the Puget Sound area, I highly recommend this book to you. It provides fascinating information about familiar plants, animals, dirt, and other natural features. A chapter is devoted to each subject, with a few chapters discussing several together. Although most people who live in this area, have some degree of familiarity with these subjects, the book provides more in depth information about each, including how they interact, are interdependent, and how they are important to the region. The book is written in an easy to read style that is not too academic for the casual reader. The topics in the first two sections include: Jellyfish, Alder, Deer, Gulls, Sea Otters, Coyote, crow, racoon & Possum; Dirt, Stream Life, Mosses & Lichens; Mosquitoes, and Spiders. The second and third sections are about Geology, Weather, Tides, Snow, Cedar, Geoducks, Crabs, cougars, Bald Eagles, and Killer Whales. The book ends with a suggested reading list and index.
Book Description
How does one learn about a place's history? Historian and naturalist Jack Nisbet looks to the relics of a region to connect the present to the distant past. In the vast western territory defined by the Columbia River, Nisbet tracks the stories and meaning of relics such as a trilobite fossil, the nearly extinct California condor, and more. Together, these stories comprise an original, hybrid history that connects nature with human endeavor, geography with the passage of time.
Customer Reviews:
Visible Bones.......2006-10-01
People who have read my reviews of other books by Jack Nisbet know that I consider him a very fine writer. "Visible Bones" is both archeological history and a nature book. It is subtitled "Journeys Across Time in the Columbia River Country" and is a series of essays on a variety of topics. The book is a combination of nature, history, people and reflection. Nisbet has a great deal of respect for Native Americans and that shows through in most of the stories.
The book starts with fossils and salamanders. It ends with Jaco Finley who was a confederate of David Thompson, an early explorer in Canada and the United States. In between we hear stories of a rock in the Columbia River that has been ground into gravel and the natural history of a mountain that ended up in the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. Always, the stories lead to people. Nisbet tells of how smallpox ravaged the native tribes and he describes a trip to gather roots with a Salish woman.
Each new story brings a different facet of life in the Columbia River Basin. Each one is gentle but leads the reader into a new avenue of thought. I read the book aloud to my wife while we drove through Washington and Oregon. It flows naturally and smooth like the water where the Musquash swims.
A strong portrait of a dynamic, changing landscape.......2003-12-08
This impressive survey of the Columbia River country concerns the journey of a fossil trilobite, the disappearance of condors, and other altered landscapes of the America Northwest. Author Jack Nisbet's intention in Visible Bones is to show how varied relics of the past have been altered over time: geology and changes blend with human records of change, taken from ship logs, field journals and news accounts, to make for a strong portrait of a dynamic, changing landscape.
Multi-dimensional.......2003-11-14
The sub-title of this book, "Journeys across Time in the Columbia River Country" gives you some idea of the scope of it. The writer, in twelve gentle essays, explores aspects of the natural and human history of the region. Combining the vast sweep of time with the wide range of ecology of such a large region is a huge undertaking. I'm in awe of a mind that can conceptualize such a topic, never mind bring it to fruition in book form. Of course 248 pages can't do the topic justice, but ten times or one hundred times the number of pages wouldn't do it justice either. The writer can only choose minute representative aspects of the whole and offer more information and a fresh lens through which to view it.
To take the dimension of history first. The writer starts out with a personal tale of hunting for trilobites in a creek swollen with snow melt. Trilobites are the tiny fossilized creatures whose massed bodies helped to create the land in this western corner of the U.S. But this is not a Geology 101 text. It places the 250 million year old fossil in the human scale of things - part of human history, part of the writer's experience. And that is the magic of this book - it takes a vast store of history, geology, nature and human nature and blends it into an understanding of how the Columbia River country used to be and how it came to be the way it is now.
The writer presents the natural history also. He shares with us the "water dog" (actually a salamander), the sheep moth and buzzards. We see muskrats through the eyes of native hunters and we discover Indian tobacco. We watch as the river changes with the coming of fur traders, dam builders and the presence of nuclear material.
The writer uses a rather circuitous approach to present a wide view of individual species and actions that are representative of eras and world views. This is a book rich with ideas, embracing a gentle all encompassing philosophy. I enjoyed this book because of the writer's understanding and appreciation of the land. On the practical side, however, the presentation of the book left something to be desired. For the reader trying to follow along, the map was inadequate. I would have appreciated a more detailed map showing historical names and places. More illustrations would have enriched the book, too.
Multi-dimensional.......2003-11-14
The sub-title of this book, "Journeys across Time in the Columbia River Country" gives you some idea of the scope of it. The writer, in twelve gentle essays, explores aspects of the natural and human history of the region. Combining the vast sweep of time with the wide range of ecology of such a large region is a huge undertaking. I'm in awe of a mind that can conceptualize such a topic, never mind bring it to fruition in book form. Of course 248 pages can't do the topic justice, but ten times or one hundred times the number of pages wouldn't do it justice either. The writer can only choose minute representative aspects of the whole and offer more information and a fresh lens through which to view it.
To take the dimension of history first. The writer starts out with a personal tale of hunting for trilobites in a creek swollen with snow melt. Trilobites are the tiny fossilized creatures whose massed bodies helped to create the land in this western corner of the U.S. But this is not a Geology 101 text. It places the 250 million year old fossil in the human scale of things - part of human history, part of the writer's experience. And that is the magic of this book - it takes a vast store of history, geology, nature and human nature and blends it into an understanding of how the Columbia River country used to be and how it came to be the way it is now.
The writer presents the natural history also. He shares with us the "water dog" (actually a salamander), the sheep moth and buzzards. We see muskrats through the eyes of native hunters and we discover Indian tobacco. We watch as the river changes with the coming of fur traders, dam builders and the presence of nuclear material.
The writer uses a rather circuitous approach to present a wide view of individual species and actions that are representative of eras and world views. This is a book rich with ideas, embracing a gentle all encompassing philosophy. I enjoyed this book because of the writer's understanding and appreciation of the land. On the practical side, however, the presentation of the book left something to be desired. For the reader trying to follow along, the map was inadequate. I would have appreciated a more detailed map showing historical names and places. More illustrations would have enriched the book, too.
Average customer rating:
- Magnificent Mountain Wilderness
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Mountains of the Coast: Photographs of Remote Corners of the Coast Mountains
Manufacturer: Harbour Publishing
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ASIN: 1550172131 |
Book Description
Along British Columbia's western edge from the Alaska panhandle to Vancouver stretches a vast alpine wilderness that ranks as one of the largest and least known on earth. Hidden in the mists beyond the heads of long, dark inlets, this sea of mountains is so isolated that hundreds of major peaks remain unnamed and much of the territory was unexplored until the closing decades of the twentieth century. Vancouver mountaineer John Baldwin, often teamed with his fellow climber John Clarke, has spent twenty-five years exploring and photographing this measureless wilderness, registering an incredible 250-plus first ascents and pioneering some epic ski traverses in the process.
Together, Baldwin, Clarke and their teams have carried out a program of dicovery that has few parallels in the history of mountaineering, and Mountains of the Coast allows the public to share the high points of their astounding experience for the first time.
Here are accounts of sudden blizzards, rumbling glaciers and month-long ski traverses over crevasse-mined icefields, side by side with peaceful scenes of alpine flowers and unexpected encounters with mountain goats and grizzly bears.
Baldwin describes the careful planning that goes into each expedition, the special freindships that develop among dedicated climbers, and the thrill of being the first human beings ever to set foot on a remote mountain peak.
Most memorable, Mountains of the Coast unveils the severe beauty of these wild places, revealing page after page of unimaginably spectacular landscapes, many of which have never before been recorded on film. Mountains of the Coast is a breathtaking journey into an unknown world that will appeal to mountain climbers, outdoor enthusiasts and armchair explorers alike.
Customer Reviews:
Magnificent Mountain Wilderness.......2002-03-24
This is a visually stunning book covering one of the remotest mountain regions of North America. Approx 150 colour photos depict the massive icefields, glaciers, high mountains and valleys east and west of the Coast Range.
The text gives the reader details of the author's travels through this vast wilderness on foot and skis and describes the difficulties encountered in such a rugged and remote area.
A must for anyone who loves "armchair wilderness travel" or for those who want to see what this magnificent and generally inaccessible region looks like.
Average customer rating:
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Drawing Shadows to Stone C: The Photography of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition 1897-1902
Barbara Mathe ,
Thomas Ross Miller ,
Stanley A. Freed ,
Ruth S. Freed ,
Laila Williamson , and
Jesup North Pacific Expedition (1897-1903)
Manufacturer: University of Washington Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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