Books in Tilbury House Nature Book series

Jonathan isn’t as strong or physical as his brother and can’t seem to please his beekeeper dad when he tries to help on the farm.Worried about the drought that has caused a big decrease in honey production, his dad is irritable and remote, seemingly unable to offer the acceptance that Jonathan yearns for. But one sleepless night Jonathan joins his mother in the kitchen making beeswax candles for sale, and discovers an outlet for his artistic talents that will make a big contribution to the family finances. Bee-fact sidebars buzz through this human story about a child trying to please his father.In this expanded paperback edition, an “About Bees” appendix offers further natural history about these vital and fascinating insects.Helps us see that sensitive, artistic boys have their own special place. Fountas & Pinnell Level O

* GREEN EARTH BOOK AWARD ** MOONBEAM GOLD AWARD(NON-FICTION) ** MARYLAND BLUE CRAB AWARD ** SOCIETY OF SCHOOL LIBRARIANS INTERNATIONAL HONOR AWARD *On a cool December morning near San Francisco, a distress call was radioed to shore by a local fisherman. He had discovered a humpback whale tangled in hundreds of yards of crab-trap lines, struggling to stay at the surface to breathe. A team of volunteers answered the call, and four divers risked their lives to rescue the enormous animal.What followed was a rare and remarkable demonstration of animal behavior. This celebrated story, beautifully depicted in Jennifer O’Connell’s mesmerizing paintings, will make you wonder about animal emotions and the unique connections we can have with animals―even whales.Fountas & Pinnell Level M

*John Burroughs Association Riverby Award**Maine Lupine Award**Skipping Stones Honor Book*You might walk right by a vernal pool and not notice it. Often mistaken for mere puddles in the woods, vernal pools are the source of life for many interesting creatures.If you look carefully, you can find them and be amazed! These secret pools form every year when low places on the forest floor fill up with rain and melted snow. They soon become home to hatching wood frogs, spotted salamanders, and fairy shrimp. Even in late summer and fall, when many vernal pools have shrunk to mud holes, creatures such as turtles and snakes rely on them for shelter and food. The Secret Pool introduces young readers to the wonders right underfoot as the voice of a vernal pool shares its secrets through the seasons, and sidebars provide fun facts on its inhabitants and the crucial role these small, often overlooked wetlands play in maintaining a healthy environment.This edition includes new backmatter features about wetland habitats and animals for classroom use and reader interest. Color Throughout

A lyrical narrative voice (the voice of the Milky Way galaxy itself) is augmented by sidebars filled with amazing facts and insights about our galaxy, and by extension, our universe.Inspired by Tilbury House’s award-winning, Kirkus-starred book The Secret Pool (2013).A lyrical narrative voice (the voice of the Milky Way galaxy itself) is augmented by sidebars filled with amazing facts and insights about our galaxy, and by extension, our universe.Features Mike Taylor’s extraordinary night sky photography and breathtaking NASA images of the births and deaths of stars and galaxies.Combines a read-aloud bedtime story with accessible, scientifically accurate sidebar features.The perfect book for a budding stargazer or astronomer.The Tilbury House Nature Book series brings the natural world to life for young readers. Each book aims for the highest standards of scientific accuracy and storytelling magic. color photography

2019 Moonbeam Silver MedalMany thousands of years ago, when a sheet of ice up to a mile thick began to let go of the land, the Atlantic Ocean flooded great valleys that had been scooped out by glaciers, and the salty waves of an inland sea lapped the green hills of Vermont. Into this arm of the sea swam Charlotte. Her milky, smooth, muscled body sliced slowly through the water like scissors through silk. Like a chirping canary, her voice echoed across dark waters showing the way to her pod as belugas have done for millions of years.In 1849, a crew building a railroad through Charlotte, Vermont, dug up strange and beautiful bones in a farmer’s field. A local naturalist asked Louis Agassiz to help identify them, and the famous scientist concluded that the bones belonged to a beluga whale. But how could a whale’s skeleton have been buried so far from the ocean? The answer―that Lake Champlain had once been an arm of the sea―encouraged radical new thinking about geological time scales and animal evolution. Charlotte’s Bones is a haunting, science-based reconstruction of how Charlotte died 11,000 years ago in a tidal marsh, how the marsh became a field, how Charlotte found a second life as the Vermont state fossil, and what messages her bones whisper to us now about the fragility of life and our changing Earth.Some reader reviews:I am a paleoanthropologist at Dartmouth College-- I study the human evolution and both retrieve & study early human fossils in Africa. We've connected very briefly on twitter when I tweeted out my love of Jeff Howe's book about Charlotte and Nick Pyerson's recent whale book. I just purchased and read Charlotte's Bones to my kids this morning. It is beyond beautiful. I tell my college students all the time that every fossil is precious; that every fossil has a story to tell and deserves to have its story told. Your book captures not just the science, but the true meaning of fossils and how they reveal a deep connectedness between living things, past and present. It is a gift of a book-- thank you. Jerry DeSilva I read Charlotte’s Bones yesterday. My sister Ellen showed it to me. It is beautifully written and illustrated to such an extent it is difficult to read without becoming very emotional. The combination of such pure prose and captivating illustration makes the reader ‘own’ Charlotte’s experience and therefore the reader cares. This is key to us humans, particularly the young ones, actually investing emotionally and practically in the fate of our precious wildlife. I think this fabulous book should be compulsory reading for children and if it makes them sad so much the better. It will help plant seeds of thought and compassion which can blossom in to a passion for respecting and conserving our precious species so under threat from the actions of us humans. Congratulations to you and Erin. Keep going and produce more on this theme please! Kind Regards, Vicky Yeates Color throughout

There is a deserted bay on a small island off Antigua where hawksbill turtles crawl ashore at night during the mating season to lay their eggs. Two months later the hatchlings―each weighing less than an ounce―emerge from the sand and scramble to the sea in the moonlight. Only a lucky few survive. Mary Beth Owens was inspired by her admiration and concern for these critically endangered animals to write and illustrate this beautiful book. The narrator―a craggy, ancient jumby tree that stands sentinel over the bay―observes a hawksbill’s arrival by night, her arduous trek to excavate a nest and bury her eggs, her solitary return to the sea, and the later diaspora of her hatchlings. Spare prose complements pages saturated with Caribbean color or brooding in ghostly moonlight. Color throughout

John Burroughs Association Riverby AwardLupine AwardSkipping Stones Honor AwardYou might walk right by a vernal pool and not notice it. Often mistaken for mere puddles in the woods, vernal pools are the source of life for many interesting creatures. If you look carefully, you can find them and be amazed! These secret pools form every year when low places on the forest floor fill up with rain and melted snow. They soon become home to hatching wood frogs, spotted salamanders, and fairy shrimp. Even in late summer and fall, when many vernal pools have shrunk to mud holes, creatures such as turtles and snakes rely on them for shelter and food. The Secret Pool introduces young readers to the wonders right underfoot as the voice of a vernal pool shares its secrets through the seasons, and sidebars provide fun facts on its inhabitants and the crucial role these small, often overlooked wetlands play in maintaining a healthy environment. Color Throughout

*GREEN EARTH BOOK AWARD* *MOONBEAM GOLD AWARD(NON-FICTION)* *MARYLAND BLUE CRAB AWARD* *SOCIETY OF SCHOOL LIBRARIANS INTERNATIONAL HONOR AWARD*On a cool December morning near San Francisco, a distress call was radioed to shore by a local fisherman. He had discovered a humpback whale tangled in hundreds of yards of crab-trap lines, struggling to stay at the surface to breathe. A team of volunteers answered the call, and four divers risked their lives to rescue the enormous animal.What followed was a rare and remarkable demonstration of animal behavior. This celebrated story, beautifully depicted in Jennifer O’Connell’s mesmerizing paintings, will make you wonder about animal emotions and the unique connections we can have with animals―even whales.Fountas & Pinnell Level M

Michael Garland (Daddy Played the Blues) displays his impressive illustration range with the stylized, country-quilt, digital collage illustrations of A Season of Flowers. Snowdrops and crocuses yield to tulips and hyacinths, then dogwood blossoms, iris, lupine, daisies, morning glories, daylilies, geraniums, peonies, sunflowers, roses, and chrysanthemums as spring passes to summer, then autumn. At last the garden slumbers into winter under a blanket of snow, preparing next year’s procession of blooms. Like actors crossing a stage, flowers narrate the passing seasons in the first person, each one briefly proclaiming its unique and vital role in the natural world. Backmatter descriptions complete this child’s introduction to a garden year, in which the passage of time is vividly realized. Fountas & Pinnell Level L Color throughout

2019 Moonbeam Silver MedalMany thousands of years ago, when a sheet of ice up to a mile thick began to let go of the land, the Atlantic Ocean flooded great valleys that had been scooped out by glaciers, and the salty waves of an inland sea lapped the green hills of Vermont. Into this arm of the sea swam Charlotte. Her milky, smooth, muscled body sliced slowly through the water like scissors through silk. Like a chirping canary, her voice echoed across dark waters showing the way to her pod as belugas have done for millions of years.In 1849, a crew building a railroad through Charlotte, Vermont, dug up strange and beautiful bones in a farmer’s field. A local naturalist asked Louis Agassiz to help identify them, and the famous scientist concluded that the bones belonged to a beluga whale. But how could a whale’s skeleton have been buried so far from the ocean? The answer―that Lake Champlain had once been an arm of the sea―encouraged radical new thinking about geological time scales and animal evolution. Charlotte’s Bones is a haunting, science-based reconstruction of how Charlotte died 11,000 years ago in a tidal marsh, how the marsh became a field, how Charlotte found a second life as the Vermont state fossil, and what messages her bones whisper to us now about the fragility of life and our changing Earth.Some reader reviews:I am a paleoanthropologist at Dartmouth College-- I study the human evolution and both retrieve & study early human fossils in Africa. We've connected very briefly on twitter when I tweeted out my love of Jeff Howe's book about Charlotte and Nick Pyerson's recent whale book. I just purchased and read Charlotte's Bones to my kids this morning. It is beyond beautiful. I tell my college students all the time that every fossil is precious; that every fossil has a story to tell and deserves to have its story told. Your book captures not just the science, but the true meaning of fossils and how they reveal a deep connectedness between living things, past and present. It is a gift of a book-- thank you. Jerry DeSilva I read Charlotte’s Bones yesterday. My sister Ellen showed it to me. It is beautifully written and illustrated to such an extent it is difficult to read without becoming very emotional. The combination of such pure prose and captivating illustration makes the reader ‘own’ Charlotte’s experience and therefore the reader cares. This is key to us humans, particularly the young ones, actually investing emotionally and practically in the fate of our precious wildlife. I think this fabulous book should be compulsory reading for children and if it makes them sad so much the better. It will help plant seeds of thought and compassion which can blossom in to a passion for respecting and conserving our precious species so under threat from the actions of us humans. Congratulations to you and Erin. Keep going and produce more on this theme please! Kind Regards, Vicky Yeates Color throughout

AWARDS: *Moonbeam Silver*, *John Burroughs Association Riverby 2016 Award* Estuaries form where river meets sea and fresh water mixes with salt. Teeming with life, these places of salt marshes, mudflats, and tidal backwaters serve as nursery areas for oceangoing fish, migratory stopovers for shorebirds, and homes for an amazing diversity of snails, bivalves, fish, mammals, horseshoe crabs, fiddler and blue crabs, terrapin turtles, plankton, and many others, all of whom we meet in the pages of this delightful book.Narrated in the poetic voice of the estuary itself, and accompanied by natural-history sidebars about estuary plants, animals, and cycles, THE SECRET BAY is another topnotch nature book from the author and illustrator of the award-winning, bestselling The Secret Pool.A stand-alone book and a stunning companion volume to Ridley and Raye’s award-winning Secret Pool.Ridley deftly augments the estuary’s lyrical narrative voice with sidebars about the plants, animals, and natural processes of an estuary.Raye’s gorgeous watercolors reveal new features and hidden treats with each reading.Back matter includes The Estuary Food Web, Great Escapes (how estuary animals avoid predators), and an author’s note about the challenges facing estuaries.A perfect book for the budding naturalist and for his or her parents and teachers.Fountas & Pinnell Level SLexile 1180 Color Throughout

CCBC Choice Book 2018 : The Annual Best of the Year List of the Cooperative Children's Book CenterThis is my busy green garden. There’s a surprise In clever disguise, That hangs in my busy green garden. This is a ladybug dawdling so, Near the surprise, in clever disguise, That hangs in my busy green garden. This is a honeybee buzzing below The red spotted ladybug dawdling so, Near the surprise, in clever disguise, That hangs in my busy green garden.So begins this lyrical tribute to the bugs, bees, and birds that make the garden such a busy place. With each turned page, more visitors appear, and all the while the “surprise”―a chrysalis―changes unnoticed until, on the last page, a butterfly emerges and flies away across the garden’s well-tended borders. Back-of-book notes about the natural histories of the garden’s denizens complete this lovely and lively portrait of backyard nature, which is also a gentle meditation on the rewards of paying attention. A chipmunk hides on every page to divert and engage young readers.Fountas & Pinnell Level O Color throughout