Books in Life of the Past series

More than 10,000 years ago spectacularly large mammals roamed the pampas and jungles of South America. This book tells the story of these great beasts during and just after the Pleistocene, the geological epoch marked by the great ice ages. Megafauna describes the history and way of life of these animals, their comings and goings, and what befell them at the beginning of the modern era and the arrival of humans. It places these giants within the context of the other mammals then alive, describing their paleobiology―how they walked; how much they weighed; their diets, behavior, biomechanics; and the interactions among them and with their environment. It also tells the stories of the scientists who contributed to our discovery and knowledge of these transcendent creatures and the environment they inhabited. The episode known as the Great American Biotic Interchange, perhaps the most important of all natural history "experiments," is also an important theme of the book, tracing the biotic events of both North and South America that led to the fauna and the ecosystems discussed in this book.

This volume, aimed at the general reader, presents life and times of the amazing animals that inhabited Earth more than 500 million years ago. The Cambrian Period was a critical time in Earth’s history. During this immense span of time nearly every modern group of animals appeared. Although life had been around for more than 2 million millennia, Cambrian rocks preserve the record of the first appearance of complex animals with eyes, protective skeletons, antennae, and complex ecologies. Grazing, predation, and multi-tiered ecosystems with animals living in, on, or above the sea floor became common. The cascade of interaction led to an ever-increasing diversification of animal body types. By the end of the period, the ancestors of sponges, corals, jellyfish, worms, mollusks, brachiopods, arthropods, echinoderms, and vertebrates were all in place. The evidence of this Cambrian "explosion" is preserved in rocks all over the world, including North America, where the seemingly strange animals of the period are preserved in exquisite detail in deposits such as the Burgess Shale in British Columbia. Cambrian Ocean World tells the story of what is, for us, the most important period in our planet’s long history.

Praise for the first edition:"A gift to serious dinosaur enthusiasts" ―Science "The amount of information in [these] pages is amazing. This book should be on the shelves of dinosaur freaks as well as those who need to know more about the paleobiology of extinct animals. It will be an invaluable library reference." ―American Reference Books Annual"An excellent encyclopedia that serves as a nice bridge between popular and scholarly dinosaur literature." ―Library Journal (starred review)"Copiously illustrated and scrupulously up-to-date... the book reveals dinos through the fractious fields that make a study of them." ―Publishers Weekly"Stimulating armchair company for cold winter evenings.... Best of all, the book treats dinosaurs as intellectual fun." ―New Scientist"The book is useful both as a reference and as a browse-and-enjoy compendium." ―Natural HistoryWhat do we know about dinosaurs, and how do we know it? How did dinosaurs grow, move, eat, and reproduce? Were they warm-blooded or cold-blooded? How intelligent were they? How are the various groups of dinosaurs related to each other, and to other kinds of living and extinct vertebrates? What can the study of dinosaurs tell us about the process of evolution? And why did typical dinosaurs become extinct? All of these questions, and more, are addressed in the new, expanded, second edition of The Complete Dinosaur. Written by many of the world's leading experts on the "fearfully great" reptiles, the book’s 45 chapters cover what we have learned about dinosaurs, from the earliest discoveries of dinosaurs to the most recent controversies. Where scientific contention exists, the editors have let the experts agree to disagree. Copiously illustrated and accessible to all readers from the enthusiastic amateur to the most learned professional paleontologist, The Complete Dinosaur is a feast for serious dinosaur lovers everywhere.

.."". a gift to serious dinosaur enthusiasts... a highly successful volume."" -- Science""The book is useful both as a reference and as a browse-and-enjoy compendium..."" -- Natural History""The amount of information in just 750 pages is amazing. This book should be on the shelves of dinosaur freaks as well as those who need to know more about the paleobiology of extinct animals. It will be an invaluable library reference."" -- American Reference Books Annual""An excellent encyclopedia that serves as a nice bridge between popular and scholarly dinosaur literature."" -- Library Journal (starred review).."". copiously illustrated and scrupulously up-to-date... the book reveals dinos through the fractious fields that make a study of them."" -- Publishers Weekly.."". stimulating armchair company for cold winter evenings... Best of all, the book treats dinosaurs as intellectual fun."" -- New ScientistThe single most authoritative account of dinosaur paleontology for the general public, all in one volume. Sumptuously illustrated, with up-to-the-minute information. More than 350 illustrations, including 16 pages in full color Each chapter written by an expert in dinosaur studies Includes the latest dinosaur discoveries New information on the warm-blooded/cold-blooded debate New insights on the possibility of isolating dinosaur DNA What dinosaurs ate -- and how we know about it Dinosaurs in the media A time-line of the history of dinosaur science And much, much more!

How can the tracks of dinosaurs best be interpreted and used to reconstruct them? In many Mesozoic sedimentary rock formations, fossilized footprints of bipedal, three-toed (tridactyl) dinosaurs are preserved in huge numbers, often with few or no skeletons. Such tracks sometimes provide the only clues to the former presence of dinosaurs, but their interpretation can be challenging: How different in size and shape can footprints be and yet have been made by the same kind of dinosaur? How similar can they be and yet have been made by different kinds of dinosaurs? To what extent can tridactyl dinosaur footprints serve as proxies for the biodiversity of their makers?Profusely illustrated and meticulously researched, Noah's Ravens quantitatively explores a variety of approaches to interpreting the tracks, carefully examining within-species and across-species variability in foot and footprint shape in nonavian dinosaurs and their close living relatives. The results help decipher one of the world's most important assemblages of fossil dinosaur tracks, found in sedimentary rocks deposited in ancient rift valleys of eastern North America. Those often beautifully preserved tracks were among the first studied by paleontologists, and they were initially interpreted as having been made by big birds―one of which was jokingly identified as Noah's legendary raven.

Why do tigers have stripes? Do they choose to have them, or is that just how they are? Adaptation and Survival explains what is meant by the fitness of an organism and shows how adaptations improve a plant or animal's chances of survival to have offspring. It tackles common confusions about the science and shows how topics are relevant to the reader.