Customer Reviews

Fire In The Turtle House: The Green Sea Turtle and the Fate of the Ocean

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Unequivocally, I loved this book! Parts biological mystery, turtle evolution, naturalist history and love story to the sea, it's wrapped up in very engaging prose. It made me fall in love with the creatures!! And apparently I'm not the only one...

In a book I read last year, "Costa Rica: The Last Country The Gods Made," the authors' dedicated the book to a green sea turtle!! It read:

"To the green sea turtle who twenty-five years ago bumped the bottom of a boat in Key West, Florida, scaring a little girl. Those tears and this book are for you and your descendants."

Here's hoping that turtle's descendants will STILL be around in another 25 years! But the more people who read this book, the more attention these endangered animals will deservedly get.

Fire In the Turtle House is a thorough, investigative account of many dedicated marine biologist, scientists, and turtle lovers trying to figure out how and why green sea turtles have become afflicted with fibropamillomatosis. The virus is killing off the specie in untold numbers and will lead to their extinction. By the reading the book not only did I learn about sea turtles, and how they live and breed, but I got an enormous education in marine biology and how the ocean is a precious habitat for these creatures. The author helped me understand by giving specific examples as to how man is contributing to the ocean's decline and thus sea life's decline. This isn't a diatribe on man but a well thought out provocative look at a very important topic told so that everyone can understand. There is a quote in the book by Arthur C. Clarke that says that our planet should not of been called Earth but perhaps "Oceana." Very true when most of the planet is made up of water, as are we. My eyes have been open to the truth of this statement after reading Fire in the Turtle House.

You didn't need to be told that humans are ruining natural environments all over the place. In the competition for survival, we are winning, beating out competitors, causing havoc, and claiming victory, however short term it may be. It is only particular aspects of the problem that are news, and we do need to be told of them for the purpose, if nothing more, of keeping our eyes open to the onslaught. Here is an aspect that you may not know about: green sea turtles are being killed off by a mysterious illness. A sincere and thoughtful book will tell you of the problem, if you can stand to hear about it: _Fire in the Turtle House: The Green Sea Turtle and the Fate of the Ocean_ (PublicAffairs) by Osha Gray Davidson. Davidson is a fine storyteller, and has pulled the history of sea turtles together with documentation about their current fate, as well as giving vivid portraits of the idiosyncratic turtle fans who are trying to do something about the turtles' problem. The particular problem for them is serious, and as Davidson's subtitle tells, it reflects a general and larger disaster.

The green sea turtle has survived for over a hundred million years, and it simply may not be around much longer. It has been overhunted, but as Davidson makes clear, overhunting is so cause-and-effect obvious that it is often blamed as the reason extinctions happen. However, a hundred years ago we were learning that the indirect methods of ignorance and indifference were far more efficient vectors of biological collapse by means of habitat destruction. We are also turning coastal waters into a breeding ground for a revolting disease called fibropapillomatosis, or FP for short. Tumors sprout on the flippers restricting motion, and around the eyes causing blindness, and within the guts causing eventual death. They are warty or smooth, and leeches live in them for the blood supply, and blood flukes lay eggs in them. In 1986 researchers were shocked that there were outbreaks of the disease in both Florida and Hawaii. The exact mechanism of the disease is in doubt, but what is not in doubt is that turtles with this disgusting and sad disease come from the areas which are most highly polluted, by fertilizers and sewage, or have sea beds gouged by trawling. Turtles from the few remaining pristine areas are so far unaffected, but no ocean creature will be unaffected by ocean temperature change, which is another way the sea becomes friendly to pathogens.

Davidson's work is full of facts and scientific information, and skillful portraits of people involved in trying to do something about this horrendous illness. If there is any defect in his book, it is that it spends its bulk explaining the problem carefully, and leaves only a few paragraphs for instruction on what we can do, and such instruction is general: "We could stop treating the ocean as if it were the world's largest garbage dump and start treating it like the sacred source of all life that it is... We could balance growth and development with habitat preservation. We could, finally, get serious about stopping global warming." Davidson is no pessimist, but sadly, it is probable that our "we coulds" are not going to change into "we wills" in time to stop this disaster, and the others connected to it.

I knew that sea turtles were endangered or threatened but never really investigated the reasons why. I found this book while perusing the book store and it caught my attention so I bought it and read it.
The book is well written and speaks to a non-biologist audience. It simply tells of the authors investigations into the reasons that they think the sea turtles are dying off at an alarming rate. It left me with my mouth gaping open and wondering why more people are not educated about the plight of this species.
While reading, the author makes you feel a part of their experiences, as if you were scuba diving with these creatures.
If the data from this book is any indication of the plight of the Earth's oceans, it is a very scary thought of what may be to come.
I recommend this book for ANYONE who is inquisitive about the hype surrounding "our dying oceans". It gives a detailed account of the afflictions affecting sea turtles and what we are trying to do to save them. The problem appears to go way beyond this mysterious virus. The book made me cry and get angry at the same time. We need to find out what is happening and target the source.
In the preface of the paperback edition, the author makes this statement: "If I could coin a blessing for a new world, it would be this: May your children swim in an ocean full of turtles." Amen to that Osha Gray Davidson.

Well I have to say after receiving this book yesterday at 6pm I was done reading it by midnight. I just couldn't put the book down. The writing is so good and the flow of the book so steady, that as a reader you can't help but remain on the edge of your seat. The other nice thing about this book is that while the subject matter is complex, it is presented in a way understandable to all. HIGHLY recommended.

I loved this book, and not just because I am a lifelong turtle nut. I couldn't put this book down although at times it made me cry. Great storytelling, intelligent without being dry, and I wanted to tell everyone I know to read it. A must read for anyone into turtles, marine biology and oceanography, ecology, commercial fishing, commercial agriculture, veterinary medicine, and medical research.

"It all rolls into one, and nothing comes for free" -Robert Hunter

A well writen, easy to read, shocking and informative review of the epidemic plaguing the sea turtles of the world. A must read for anyone interested in sea turtles and/or the health of the world's oceans in general. Once I started reading I couldn't put it down.

My daughter made a gift of Fire In The Turtle House: The Green Sea Turtle and the Fate of the Ocean by Osha Gray Davidson out of the blue. She spent some of an Amazon gift card that she had earned for babysitting the neighbor's turtle, frog, and cats. This was a sweet surpise that broke my heart because it describes a mysterious disease that has crippled sea turtles around the world.

Davidson traces the mysterious and deadly fibropapillamatosis tumors that have killed or crippled countless sea turtles around the world. He follows the paths of marine scientists who have sought to determine the cause of these tumors over the past century. His research and reporting journey took him around the world and deep into maritime history. Fire in the Turtle House is at once scientific, social, and political history book that ultimately points to human activity as the source of the problem that has led to the fibropapillamatosis tumors that have eaten giant holes into the sea turtle population around the world.

Fire in the Turtle House is a reminder that we can be as much a part of the solution to the environmental crises that have led to this marine epidemic as we have been a part of the problem. The book leaves us with the question, Will we be?

A gripping read, this book is a must-have for just about anyone who has an interest on turtles and/or the ocean. If I could use one word to describe this, it would be sensational. It's a beautifully written book that calls to humanity through the voice of the ocean; an enthralling read that is never boring or uninteresting. After reading this, it made me think all the more about our oceans and what is happening to our world. The virus fibropapillomatosis that affecting sea turtles at a hurricane rate is just part of what happens when we neglect our most valuable resource. However, all is not lost. If people can take the time to learn, value, and rebuild the ocean, all can be made whole again. This book would be the first step to that.

Excellent book. Well written and very informative.Fire In The Turtle House: The Green Sea Turtle and the Fate of the Ocean