The New Wolves [Paperback]

Rick Bass (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 2001

On the Mexican wolves of the Southwest.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"This is a ballad of a book, a hymn to the gloriously defiant power of survival."--Publishers Weekly

From the Back Cover

Mexican wolves once roamed freely throughout the Southwest, until they were hunted to extinction when cattle came to the region. Bass's passionate and beautifully written account of their return is one that few readers will ever forget. (5 1/2 X 8 1/4, 184 pages, maps, drawings)

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Product Details

• Paperback: 184 pages
• Publisher: The Lyons Press; 1st edition (March 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1585742651
• ISBN-13: 978-1585742653
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.6 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.3 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,314,223 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Political, social and natural history blend, May 28, 2001

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The New Wolves (Paperback)

Rick Bass' New Wolves (1-58574-265-1, $14.95) charts the return of the Mexican Wolf to the American Southwest and the controversies surrounding its preservation. Political, social and natural history blend in essays which survey the wolves and provide first-person observations. A recommended pick for any who love animals and natural history.

4.0 out of 5 stars Caring for the Country..., November 11, 2008

By 

John P. Jones III (Albuquerque, NM, USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The New Wolves (Paperback)

Real patriots do more than wear a flag in the label. They truly care for that part of the earth that the flag represents, and are distressed by the abuse the land has taken. The last of the Mexican wolves (or lobos) in the Southwest were captured in the 1970's, and placed in zoos. Fear of wolves seems to be "hardwired" into human's DNA, no doubt from prehistoric times, when there were real clashes between the two species over food territories. This fear, even loathing, was captured by Willa Cather, another author who has written about the Southwest, in her classic book on the American plains, "My Antonio." In this book three Russians who have immigrated to Nebraska are held in contempt because of the rumors that their past had included throwing the bride and groom off a sled traveling through the Russian steppe in winter - literally, "to the wolves," to slow down their pursuit. Furthermore, wolves in America do, from time to time, attack, and eat livestock - and thus there is much hostility from many ranchers to their existence. But solving the rancher's concerns by taking the wolf out of the eco-system lead to those famous "unintended consequences" which include overgrazing of the land by deer and elk, that were the natural prey of the wolf.

Rick Bass has written an important book which tells the story of a few real patriots who have tried to re-introduce the wolf into its natural habitat. He describes the problem in the first chapter entitled "Drought." Some students and a few teachers became interested in making "amends" to nature by restoring some of the original eco-system, and one chapter covers the painstaking steps taken by this group to prepare wolves that had been raised in captivity to their new life "in the wild." By far though, most of the book details the human "strife" surrounding the new program, including support from the federal government, opposition from the ranchers, the provocative role of an eco-anarchist (Dave Foreman, founder of Earth First!), and the unlikely support of a billionaire who had made his money in the media, Ted Turner.

The University of New Mexico football team is called the "lobos," so there remains much local interest in the project... pro and con, and there are the scattered articles in the paper, which even carry the perhaps true story of school children being threatened by wolves at the bus stop. Then again, it may simply be the hysteria from the "hardwired" loathing of wolves. Bass book is now 10 years old; in the interim the political winds have blown against those who believe that more funds should be spent on preserving our natural environment, including our National Parks. Though it might be discouraging, the book should be updated to cover this period. The political winds have again changed, and those interested in our environment and infrastructure are now ascendant. A recommended read.