I’ve always been fascinated by the natural world. On weekends you can find me hiking in the woods, visiting one of the many gardens or natural spaces around Philadelphia, or simply tending to the tiny jungle that has overtaken the windows of my house.
Although I feel at home in these spaces, I am far from the only creature who claims to occupy them. In fact, I exist in a natural world where I am knowingly the invasive species. And while I do my best to respect this fact, I cannot escape the footprint humans have left in our ecosystems.
In today’s recommendations are three books from the POV of humans seeking to understand and coexist with all of Earth’s inhabitants.
Tales from the Ant World by Edward O. Wilson
Nature is the metaphorical goddess of all existence that lies beyond human control.
Humanity is blessed to the extent we love her, and her products, from the sweet descent
of the sunsets to the tantrums of her thunderstorms, and from the empty vast spaces
beyond her biosphere to the seething diversity within it, of which we ourselves are a
recent chance addition.
-Edward O. Wilson
We lost a great naturalist last year when Edward O. Wilson passed away at 92. The American Biologist was the leading expert in the behaviors of ants, the tiny empire builders living underfoot. In Tales from the Ant World Wilson shares his personal journey to the world of ants before giving an overview of these creatures and their unseen realms.
Did you know the study of ants is called Myrmecology? And did you know that ants speak to each other through pheromones? And that’s not all! Many species of ants frequently go to war with neighboring colonies, and their soldiers are often the oldest among them, who have little left to offer the colony beyond the ultimate sacrifice. Bleak! And when some of those ants battle, they do so by combining into super weapons of ants piling on one another and spraying formic acid from their abdomens. Gross! And that’s just fighting stuff. These little creatures build cities, maintain societies, and sustain a matriarchal monarchy system that has conquered nearly every corner of the planet.
The book is a collection of brief insights, designed to pique interest. For some it will inspire further enquiries and probably lead them to more of Wilson’s work. For the rest of us, it’s just the right amount of information on ants to satisfy curiosity while supplying some fun party conversation starters.
World of Wonders by Aimee Nezhukumatathil
Poet Aimee Nezhukumatathil recounts the major movements of her life through a series of essays relating a lived experience through its intersections with the natural world. And she accomplishes this in a slim 165 pages.
While discussing the surreal beauty of the peacock, Nezhukumatathil recalls a racist teacher who dismissed her drawings of the bird as Un-American. The smiling face of an axolotl beckons the author to a safe space away from casual insults and ignorance. The unhatched chrysalis of a Monarch Butterfly provides Nezhukumatathil’s children with a brief but brutal lesson on the fragility of life.
Narwhals, fireflies, and even corpse flowers all appear in the threads of Nezhukumatathil’s memory, fixed points and guideposts, living metaphors in our shared existence. Nezhukumatathil’s language is sparse but effective, and nature (like humans) is realized in all its glory and flaws. In World of Wonders Aimee Nezhukumatathil mirrors what it means to be human by remembering that humans are only a small piece of a wider and wilder world.
Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law by Mary Roach
Humans are an invasive species. We spread out and develop any spaces that can contain us without much consideration for the wildlife that already calls those spaces home. Conflict naturally occurs, and as we hold the status of the most intellectually advanced animal on Earth it is up to us to find the balances life demands. And, maybe because of our humanity, we are mostly failing.
Mary Roach’s latest scientific road trip takes readers on ride-alongs with the people tasked with policing the battlegrounds between Man and Nature. Meet the National Wildlife Research Center workers inspecting trash cans around Aspen to ensure bears can’t eat from them, thus developing a dependency on humans for food. Come along with the researchers from the Wildlife Institute of India who monitor incidents of leopard mauling and elephant trampling while considering who deserves protection when humans and animals are afforded equal legal protections. And then there are the folks who develop flight systems for inevitable mid-air bird collisions (think Miracle on the Hudson scenarios).
With a tone somehow both grave and humorous, Roach recounts the lessons from each expert. No system is perfect, no solutions are without flaws. Despite our best efforts, or lack thereof, we are mostly getting it wrong. But as long as humans are dedicated to exploring these issues, there is hope that one day we’ll get it right.
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