Habitats: Earth’s Precious Wild Places Revealed

This book is a beautiful visual reference to the world’s natural habitats and the plants and animals that live there. It explores global habitat types, including desert, Arctic tundra, or tropical forest – and also distinctive regional kinds, such as the windswept puna grasslands of the Andes or the dripping, fern-clad rainforests of New Zealand. Packed with fascinating illustrations, the book analyses how each habitat works and examines its unique combination of plants and animals, along with the features that suit them to live there. It then goes deeper, telling stories about how the inhabitants relate to one another and interact. Stories are told using images and graphics, showing what is going on in the natural ecosystem. The stories include survival strategies and life cycles, how pollinators fertilize plants, and how animals distribute the seeds, how similar species divide up food or living space to avoid competition, and how some species cooperate in intimate partnerships. Earth’s pristine wildernesses are dwindling, so the book includes national parks, wildlife reserves, and other protected areas, and the conservation efforts needed to preserve our precious biological diversity.