Screen LibraryChuckwalla land：the riddle of California's desert
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| Main Authors: | |
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| Published: |
University of California Press,
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| Publisher Address: | Berkeley |
| Publication Dates: | c2011. |
| Literature type: | Book |
| Language: | English |
| Subjects: | |
| Carrier Form: | xxii, 255 p.: ; 24 cm. |
| ISBN: |
9780520256163 (alk. paper) 0520256166 (alk. paper) |
| Index Number: | Q151 |
| CLC: | Q151.94 |
| Call Number: | Q151.94/W188 |
| Contents: |
Includes bibliographical references and index. A sphinx in Arcady -- The country of dried skin -- A cactus heresy -- The creator's dumping ground -- An evolutionary backwater -- Anti-Darwinian Lacertilians -- Descriptive confusion -- A murderous brood -- Hopeful monsters -- An Old Earth-feature -- A climatic accident -- An evolutionary frontier -- A neo-Darwinian Galapagos -- Mexican geneses -- Desert relicts -- Madro-tertiary attitudes -- A friendly land -- Furry paleontologists -- Dawn horses and dinosaurs -- Axelrod antagonists -- The midday sun -- Lacertilian ambiguities -- Xerothermic invasions -- Sand swimmers -- Axelrod ascendant Drawing from his frequent forays to Death Valley, Red Rock Canyon, Kelso Dunes, and other locales, the author illuminates the desert's intriguing flora and fauna as he explores a controversial, unresolved scientific debate about the origin and evolution of its unusual ecosystems. Eminent scientists and scholars appear throughout these pages, including maverick paleobiologist Daniel Axelrod, botanist Ledyard Stebbins, and naturalists Edmund Jaeger and Joseph Wood Krutch. Weaving together ecology, geology, natural history, and mythology in his characteristically eloquent voice, the author reve |