Nature Out of Place: Biological Invasions In The Global Age [Hardcover]

Jason Van Driesche (Author), Roy Van Driesche (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1559637579 | ISBN-13: 978-1559637572 | Publication Date: October 1, 2000 | Edition: 1

Though the forests are still green and the lakes full of water, an unending stream of invasions is changing many ecosystems around the world from productive, tightly integrated webs of native species to loose assemblages of stressed native species and aggressive invaders. The earth is becoming what author David Quammen has called a "planet of weeds". "Nature Out of Place" brings this devastating but overlooked crisis to the forefront of public consciousness by offering an exploration of its causes and consequences, along with a thoughtful and practical consideration of what can be done about it. The father and son team of Jason and Roy Von Driesche offer a unique combination of narratives that highlight specific locations and problems along with comprehensive explanations of the underlying scientific and policy issues. Chapters examine Hawaii, where introduced feral pigs are destroying the islands' native forests; zebra mussel invasion in the rivers of Ohio; the decades-long effort to eradicate an invasive weed on the Great Plains; and a story about the restoration of both ecological and human history in an urban natural area. In-depth background chapters explain topics ranging from how ecosystems become diverse, to the charactersitics of effective invaders, to procedures and policies that can help prevent future invasions. The book ends with a number of specific suggestions for ways that individuals can help reduce the impacts of invasive species, and offers resources for further information. By bringing the problem of invasive species to life for readers at all levels, "Nature Out of Place" should play an important role in the vital effort to raise public awareness on this ongoing ecological crisis.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Not long ago, while waiting to board a plane, environmental scientist Jason van Driesche noticed a Hawaiian tourism poster that showed a lush ravine carpeted with flowering trees and shrubs, "an exotic destination if ever there was one." If, that is, "exotic" means "alien," for the plants in the picture were all invaders from other continents: African tulip trees, Indian kahili ginger, and other non-native species that thrive on ecological disturbance and the willingness of humans to transport plants and animals from one ecosystem to another without pausing to consider the consequences.

Those consequences, write van Driesche and his fellow scientist and father Roy van Driesche, are enormous. The ever-increasing globalization of agriculture and commerce is remaking the earth into a "planet of weeds," replacing biological diversity with a seemingly inescapable sameness of forms. In Nature Out of Place, they catalog some of these losses, showing how humankind's preference for the "best" species is yielding catastrophe on every continent. More helpfully, they offer a program of action for people to stem and even undo some of that destruction by landscaping with native plants, shunning exotic pets, eating locally grown foods, and protecting old, biologically rich habitats close to home. Clear-headed and illuminating, their book makes a useful tool for anyone concerned with environmental restoration and preservation. --Gregory McNamee

About the Author

Jason Van Driesche is currently a graduate student in the Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Roy Van Driesche teaches and researches biological control at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, and is co-author of the textbook Biological Control (Chapman and Hall, 1996). --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 365 pages
• Publisher: Island Press; 1 edition (October 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1559637579
• ISBN-13: 978-1559637572
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,126,480 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An Interesting Topic Written in an Interesting Style., August 13, 2001

By 

Earl Dennis (San Francisco, California United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Nature Out of Place: Biological Invasions In The Global Age (Hardcover)

Global ecology books are generally interesting because they gather diffuse and disparate data about the dynamics of terrestrial life into a syncretic whole which allows us a glimpse of events occuring on a global scale. This book, released last year, is probably a fairly current snapshot of certain pressing global happenings regarding native and invasive species, and provides sufficient corroborating resources for the hard scientist (no troublesome endnote numbers in the text, but the supporting references do appear in the endnotes at the back of the book). The popular science reader is well attended to as well in this book by the lack of distracting endnote numbers in the text and the moderate but sufficient statistical data intercalated into the text.

The other interesting aspect of this book is the style in which it is written. The authors are a father and son team who write alternating chapters in two distinct styles that nonetheless blend well with one another and are rather self-enhancing rather than distracting. The father portion of this duo, Roy Van Driesche, teaches biological control at UMass, Amherst, and tackles the essay-style chapters on more general subject matter. The son, Jason Van Driesche, a graduate student of environmental studies at UWis, Madison, writes the 1st-person particular accounts of specific, ongoing invasive species problems. The alternating styles tend to break up what could have become a dessicated excercise in patience into a more palatable and enjoyable romp through the ecology of noxious invasive species and the current human responses to them.

The thesis of the book is, of course, how hundreds of years of unchecked waves of invasions by people and their concomitant pests, whether by invitation or as stowaways, is leading to a species homogenization, whereby the unscrupulous and hardy experts of survival: humans, rats, feral cats, weeds, fungi, etc. have and continue to decimate the more delicate and isolated species that simply cannot compete against the obviously hardier and more adaptable species. It's ecological whining at its finest, but the facts, as always, carry the day.

I particularly enjoyed son Jason's chapters, which are largely based on interviews with the locals who must deal with such problems. For example, leafy spurge on the great plains of the United States has been claiming untold acres of land generally used for grazing lands for ranchers (whose wards traditionally munch on, as it were, some invasive grass species of yore, you just can't win). Cattle shun leafy spurge, so the sustainable number of cattle per acre has diminished, distressing local cattle men and forcing them to take action or suffer the consequences (these are not your typical tree-huggers, but macho cowboys who probably smoke Camel non-filters). This setting is then revealed as a success case of biological control, father Roy's bailiwick, wherein asian beetles were imported to counterattack the otherwise indescriminately spreading green plague. The two styles really compliment one another in this regard. The discussions of island ecology regarding Hawai'i, Guam, New Zealand, and Santa Cruz island are also timely, interesting, and well covered. It's edifying to read in this book how public and private groups are beginning to take heed of these serious problems and actually legislate in favor of resistance to invasive species once and a while, but it's also frightening to realize such political action is occuring in mostly developed nations, and that vast, uncharted ecological and political events in undeveloped nations are generally not even under consideration. Apparently it's a jungle out there and the jungle is being remodeled at a blistering pace. All in all, a good read any bonified naturalist will admire.

2 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great intro to bioinvasions, August 6, 2005

By 

P. W. Duggan (Winnetka, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Nature Out of Place: Biological Invasions In The Global Age (Hardcover)

I found this book to be a refereshing look at biological invasions. It takes in not only ecology but social factors, such as regular folks who have to deal with these pest species.

I feel this book is a step up from other popular-science books on the topic, such as Out of Eden by Alan Burdick.