Teaching the trees : lessons from the forest

In this collection of natural-history essays, biologist Joan Maloof embarks on a series of lively, fact-filled expeditions into forests of the eastern United States. Each engaging, conversational essay is a lesson in stewardship about the interwoven connections between a tree species and the animals and insects whose lives depend on it - and who, in turn, work to ensure the tree's survival. Never really at home in a laboratory, Maloof took to the woods early in her career. Her enthusiasm for firsthand observation in the wild spills over into her writing, whether the subject is the composition of forest air, the eagle's preference for nesting in loblolly pines, the growth rings of the bald cypress, or the gray squirrel's fondness for weevil-infested acorns.