Southeastern Naturalist
Noteworthy Books
2015 Vol. 14, No. 4
B4
Exploring Southern Appalachian Forests:
An Ecological Guide to 30 Great Hikes in the
Carolinas, Georgia, Tennessee, and Virginia.
Stephanie B. Jeffries and Thomas R. Wentworth.
2014. The University of North Carolina Press,
Chapel Hill, NC. 336 pp., $17.06, softcover, ISBN
9781469619798. This unique hiking guide to the
southern Appalachian mountains leads readers
to explore the rich forest ecosystems and other
natural communities visitors encounter along the
trail. Drawing on years of experience guiding forest
walks throughout the region, Steph Jeffries and
Tom Wentworth invite hikers and nature lovers to
see their surroundings in new ways. Readers will
learn to decipher clues from the tree canopies, forest
floor, and other natural features to appreciate
more fully the environmental factors that make the
southern Appalachians home to an amazing biodiversity.
These 30 popular hikes in Virginia, North
Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Georgia
range from short walks along Blue Ridge Parkway
pull-offs to longer day trips in the region's backcountry.
Offering spectacular mountain scenery
and natural wildflower gardens, these trails are
the perfect place to gain a new appreciation for
the natural communities of the region. Features
include a summary including distance, difficulty,
and GPS coordinates for each hike; a narrative
description of each hike, including the unique
natural features waiting to be discovered; detailed
instructions to keep you on the trail; best seasons
to go for wildflower and foliage views; contact
information for each area; photos and maps to orient
you; and an illustrated guide to southern Appalachia's
most common trees and shrubs, including
tips on identification.
The Curious Mister Catesby: A "Truly Ingenious"
Naturalist Explores New Worlds. David
Elliott. 2015. The University of Georgia Press,
Athens GA. 456 pp. $41.25, hardcover, ISBN
9780820347264. In 1712, English naturalist Mark
Catesby (1683–1749) crossed the Atlantic to
Virginia. After a 7-year stay, he returned to England
with paintings of plants and animals he had
studied. They sufficiently impressed other naturalists
that in 1722 several Fellows of the Royal
Society sponsored his return to North America.
There Catesby cataloged the flora and fauna of
the Carolinas and the Bahamas by gathering seeds
and specimens, compiling notes, and making watercolor
sketches. Going home to England after 5
years, he began the 20-year task of writing, etching,
and publishing his monumental The Natural
History of Carolina, Florida, and the Bahama
Islands. Mark Catesby was a man of exceptional
courage and determination combined with insatiable
curiosity and multiple talents. Nevertheless
no portrait of him is known. The international
contributors to this volume review Catesby’s
biography alongside the historical and scientific
significance of his work. Ultimately, this lavishly
illustrated volume advances knowledge of Catesby’s
explorations, collections, artwork, and publications
in order to reassess his importance within
the pantheon of early naturalists.
Freshwater Mussels of Florida. Gary L. Warren,
James David Williams, Nathan A. Johnson, and
Robert S. Butler. 2014. University of Alabama
Press, Tuscaloosa, AL.528 pp., $49.95, hardcover,
ISBN 9780817318475. An exhaustive guide to all
aspects of the freshwater mussel fauna in Florida,
Freshwater Mussels of Florida covers the ecology,
biology, distribution, and conservation of the
many species of bivalve mollusks in the Sunshine
State. In the past three decades, researchers, the
public, businesses that depend on wildlife, and
policy makers have given more attention to the
threatened natural diversity of the Southeast,
including freshwater mussels. This compendium
meets the increasingly urgent need to catalog
this imperiled group of aquatic organisms in the
United States. Each entry in this definitive guide
provides a detailed description and multiple depictions
of the species as well as select characteristics
of its soft anatomy and miscellaneous notes
of interest. Individual distribution maps pinpoint
the historical and present occurrence of each bivalve
species and are just one component of the
rich set of 307 mussel and habitat photographs,
74 maps, and 13 tables that illustrate the book.
Of particular interest are remarkable electron
micrographs of glochidia, the specialized larval
life-history stage parasitic upon fishes. Freshwater
Mussels of Florida will be of lasting value to
state and federal conservation agencies as well
as other government and nongovernment entities
that manage aquatic resources in Florida. The research
provides a key baseline for future study of
Florida mussels. The survey results in this guide,
along with extensive reviews of historical mussel
collections in natural history museums, provide a
complete picture of the Florida mussel fauna, past
and present.
Noteworthy Books
Received by the Southeastern Naturalist, Issue 14/4, 2015
Southeastern Naturalist
B5
Noteworthy Books
2015 Vol. 14, No. 4
The Southeastern Naturalist welcomes submissions of review copies of books that publishers or authors
would like to recommend to the journal’s readership and are relevant to the journal’s mission of publishing
information about the natural history of the southeastern US. Accompanying short, descriptive summaries
of the text are also welcome.
The Leatherback Turtle: Biology and Conservation
Edited by James R. Spotila and Pilar Santidrian
Tomillo. 2015. The Johns Hopkins University
Press, Baltimore, MD. 246 pp., $70.00,
hardcover, ISBN 9781421417080. Weighing as
much as 2000 pounds and reaching lengths of
over 7 feet, Leatherback Turtles are the world’s
largest reptile. These unusual sea turtles have a
thick, pliable shell that helps them to withstand
great depths—they can swim more than 1000 m
below the surface in search of food. And what
food source sustains these goliaths? Their diet
consists almost exclusively of jellyfish, a meal
they crisscross the oceans to find. Leatherbacks
have been declining in recent decades, and some
predict they will be gone by the end of this century.
Why? Because of two primary factors: human
redevelopment of nesting beaches and commercial
fishing. There are only 29 index beaches
in the world where these turtles nest, and there is
immense pressure to develop most of them into
homes or resorts. At the same time, long-line and
gill-net fisheries continue to overwhelm waters
frequented by Leatherbacks. In The Leatherback
Turtle, Spotila and Tomillo bring together the
world’s leading experts to produce a volume that
reveals the biology of the Leatherback while putting
a spotlight on the conservation problems and
solutions related to the species. The book leaves
us with options: embark on the conservation
strategy laid out within its pages and save one
of nature’s most splendid creations, or watch yet
another magnificent species disappear.
The Slain Wood: Papermaking and its Environmental
Consequences in the American
South. William Boyd. 2015. The Johns Hopkins
University Press, Baltimore, MD. 350 p.,
$55.00, hardcover, ISBN 9781421418780. When
the paper industry moved into the South in the
1930s, it confronted a region in the midst of an
economic and environmental crisis. Entrenched
poverty, stunted labor markets, vast stretches of
cutover lands, and severe soil erosion prevailed
across the southern states. By the middle of the
20th century, however, pine trees had become the
region’s number one cash crop, and the South
dominated national and international production
of pulp and paper based on the intensive cultivation
of timber. In The Slain Wood, William Boyd
chronicles this dramatic growth of the pulp and
paper industry in the American South and the
social and environmental changes that accompanied
it. Drawing on extensive interviews and
historical research, he tells the fascinating story
of one of the region’s most important but understudied
industries. The Slain Wood reveals how a
thoroughly industrialized forest was created out
of a degraded landscape, uncovers the ways in
which firms tapped into informal labor markets
and existing inequalities of race and class to
fashion a system for delivering wood to the mills,
investigates the challenges of managing large
papermaking complexes, and details the ways in
which mill managers and unions discriminated
against black workers. It also shows how the
industry’s massive pollution loads significantly
disrupted local environments and communities,
leading to a long struggle to regulate and control
that pollution.
The Ecological Importance of Mixed-Severity
Fires: Nature's Phoenix. Dominick A. DellaSala
and Chad T. Hanson. 2015. Elsevier Science,
Maryland Heights, MO. 450 pp., $89.95,
soft cover, ISBN9780128027493. This new book
presents information on the current paradigm
shift in the way people think about wildfire and
ecosystems. While much of the current forest
management in fire-adapted ecosystems, especially
forests, is focused on fire prevention and
suppression, little has been reported on the ecological
role of fire, and nothing has been presented
on the importance of high-severity fire with
regards to the maintenance of native biodiversity
and fire-dependent ecosystems and species. This
text fills that void, providing a comprehensive
reference for documenting and synthesizing fire’s
ecological role. It offers the first reference written
on mixed- and high-severity fires and their
relevance for biodiversity; contains a broad synthesis
of the ecology of mixed- and high-severity
fires covering such topics as vegetation, birds,
mammals, insects, aquatics, and management
actions; and explores the conservation vs. public
controversy issues around megafires in a rapidly
warming world.