Animal tracks in the snow of the mountain forest, in the mud along a streambank, or in the sand of the desert are much more than footprints. James Halfpenny’s Field Guide will allow the nature lover to satisfy his or her curiosity by identifying the animal that left the prints. But identification is only the beginning of a fascinating activity: interpretation is the rewarding goal of this book. With it anyone can be a nature detective, able to reconstruct the behavior of mammals from mice to moose. Tracks tell stories and the user of this book can read them. Based on field research, much of it the author’s own, the book brings the amateur naturalist the latest information on animal gaits and the interpretation of scat.
Jim is an author, scientist, educator whose interest in COLD (altitudinal, latitudinal, and seasonal) has taken him to all seven continents and Greenland. Jim's specialities include environmental ecology, animal tracking, and carnivores; his greatest academic love, bears, led to over 20 years studying black, grizzly and polar bears. He also works with wolverine, lynx, cougar and wolves.
Jim has written over 25 books and videos including some of his latest, Yellowstone Bears in the Wild, Track Plates for Mammals, and Tracking wolves: The Basics. He led the American East Greenland expeditions in 1975 and 1976 and is a Fellow of the Explorer's Club and received the Antarctic Service medal. Jim is past Chairman of the Board of Directors, senior instructor, and administrative liason officer of the National Outdoor Leadership School.
Currently Jim is President of A Naturalist's World, an ecological education company. A past Research Fellow of the Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research, Jim was Director of the Mountain Research Station and the Long-Term Ecological Research program in the Alpine. He is listed in Who's Who in the World 1989-1993, Who's Who in Emerging Leaders 1989-1996, Who's Who in Western America 1987-1997 and Who's Who In Science. A Vietnam veteran, Jim received the Navy Achievement Medal with Combat "V" and Vietnamese Gallantry Cross with Palm.
Jim received his Ph.D. in 1980 in Biology, Ecology, & Mammalogy from the University of Colorado. His B.S. in 1969 and M.S. in 1970 both in Botany & Ecology from the University of Wyoming. At the University of Wyoming, Jim was President of Wyoming Mountain Resuce and the Outing Club, on the President's Academic Honor Roll, University of Wyoming and a four-year letterman in diving, swimming and water polo.
