Owls Aren't Wise & Bats Aren't Blind: A Naturalist Debunks Our Favorite Fallacies About Wildlife [Paperback]

Warner Shedd (Author), Trudy Nicholson (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 31, 2001

Have you ever seen a flying squirrel flapping through the air, watched a beaver carrying a load of mud on its tail, or ducked when a porcupine started throwing its quills? Probably not, says Warner Shedd, debunking these and many more popular myths about our animal friends in Owls Aren't Wise & Bats Aren't Blind. In this charming and eminently readable biology lesson, Warner Shedd, former regional executive for the National Wildlife Federation, offers scientific evidence that refutes many of the most tenacious and persevering folklore about wild animals. Full of humorous anecdotes and fascinating facts about more than thirty North American species, Owls Aren't Wise & Bats Aren't Blind is an entertaining dose of scientific reality for any nature enthusiast or armchair adventurer.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Ever pick up a toad only to have it soak your hand? Don't worry, it was the animal's emergency water storage (not urine!), dumped in a fight-or-flight panic. Think that new beaver clan will dent the trout population in your favorite fishing hole? They don't touch the stuff: beavers are strictly vegan. And go ahead, get close to that porcupine, because they can't fire quills like an AK-47. Want more? Warner Shedd, a native Vermonter, lifelong naturalist, former Forest Service honcho, and a retired executive for the National Wildlife Federation, dispels wildlife fallacies that have passed through generations of well-intended grandfathers and poorly informed folk tales. Shedd covers everything about most backyard critters--from gray squirrels to newts--and expands on some wilder species that we only think we understand.

But Shedd's refreshing anecdotes aren't entirely naysaying. In fact, he confirms many myths with a bit of explanatory elaboration. Take the raven's knack for mimicry, for example; it's entirely capable of uttering "nevermore" if it desires. And while bats aren't entirely blind, Shedd writes, they rely largely on echolocation to navigate, bouncing high-frequency shrieks off nearby objects, sometimes in the range of 115 kilohertz (a human's range goes to a mere 20 kHz).

While these details gives us some solid facts to gnash on, it's Shedd's personal anecdotes (much to the dismay of his resilient Labrador Heidi, who, while accompanying Shedd, has been jumped by muskrats and porcupines, among other things) that elevate his information to entertainment. Retelling stories from his boyhood in Vermont and from his professional work, he takes the reader on a ride through familiar territory: describing roadside carcasses, trash-ravaging raccoons, and clumsy coyotes, among other encounters. To keep us current, however, Shedd updates ongoing conservation efforts and opens an occasional window into his own personal opinions on wildlife management. We're left with a satisfying, inspiring handbook to some of North America's most familiar and erroneously understood creatures. --Lolly Merrell --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

Owls can't learn beans compared with ravens and jays; they are, however, "superb killing machines," with "virtually silent flight" and wonderful earsA"sightless owls can catch mice by sound alone." Combining reader-friendly wildlife biology and ecology with the folklore of the New England woods, Shedd (who runs the New Hampshire Wildlife Federation) uses common mistakes as springboards for 24 entertaining essays about the real lives, habits and characteristics of various well-known animals. Most concern mammals, from weasels to white-tailed deer, though "The Newt and the Red Eft" get a chapter to themselves, or to itself (the two names describe pond- and land-dwelling stages of the same animal). Moose, it turns out, gained in numbers in northeastern forests after timber companies' clear-cuts created vast "moose pastures" of young trees. Flying squirrels are really gliding squirrels, and during the winter up to eight shack up together. Shedd's helpful chapter on cougars distinguishes the Florida panther (endangered) from its cousins in the Western U.S. (fierce and thriving) and their surviving cousins in the Northeast (mostly mythicalAthough some poor souls, returning from the mountain states, have brought home cougar kittens as pets). Cougars (like most big cats) don't chase their prey: stalking and pouncing, they rely on surprise instead. Hikers, forest fans, armchair naturalists and others who enjoy these kinds of facts can find plenty more here on bisons, beavers, badgers, bears and other North American creatures (many elegantly depicted in illustrations by Trudy Nicholson). As for those titular bats, "most actually see quite well," though their amazing sonar system, as Shedd describes it, serves most of their in-flight needs. Agent, Linda Roghaar. (June)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Three Rivers Press (July 31, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0609807978
• ISBN-13: 978-0609807972
• Product Dimensions: 6.2 x 0.7 x 9.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #957,948 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Superior North American wildlife book, February 4, 2001

By 

Dennis Littrell (SoCal) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Owls Aren't Wise & Bats Aren't Blind: A Naturalist Debunks Our Favorite Fallacies About Wildlife (Hardcover)

I didn't really think that owls were wise, but these things are relative. Owls are probably "wiser" than sparrows, but certainly not in the same IQ league as ravens and crows. And, although I didn't suppose that bats were completely blind (Shedd assures us that "most actually see quite well"), I knew they didn't depend on their eyes to catch prey. There is a lot of other "obvious" and generally well-known information here, but there is also a wealth of knowledge about thirty or so of the familiar animals of North America that I didn't know or even suspect. I didn't realize, for example, that there are "frequency modulation" (FM) bats as well as ones that use a "constant frequency" (CF), and a third group (CF-FM types) that use both methods of echolocation to zero in on prey. For another example, while I knew that grizzlies are bigger than black bears, I didn't know that Alaskan brown bears are the biggest bears of all, and are not just another name for grizzlies.

What makes this a superior book on the wildlife of North America is the wealth of experience that Shedd brings to the subject and his imminently readable style, combining lots of concrete fact with well-told anecdote. He does an especially good job of clearly defining each species. The chapter on bears is as vivid and memorable as a PBS special. The easy reading (and this is always the case) belies what I know was the very hard work that went into the construction of every sentence. Typical of Shedd's illustrative style (in the floral mode) is this description from page 68: "...a bat's flight is as unpredictable and indecipherable as the movements of a prestidigitator's hands."

Additionally there are a number of beautiful full-page black and white illustrations of the animals by Trudy Nicholson that delight the eye. She has the knack of not only accurate detail, as Shedd notes in the Acknowledgments, but of infusing the animals with a sense of an appropriate and pleasing emotional aspect.

Politically speaking, and every wildlife book in this day and age has its political position, this book steers a middle course. Shedd, himself a hunter and a conservationist, eschews both the tree-hugging sentimentality of the left and the purely commercial mentality of the right.

Attractive and popular, Owls Aren't Wise and Bats Aren't Blind, would make an ideal present for anyone interested in wildlife, from grandchildren to grandparents.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars owls aren't wise, July 12, 2000

By 

Roy Schwarz - See all my reviews

This review is from: Owls Aren't Wise & Bats Aren't Blind: A Naturalist Debunks Our Favorite Fallacies About Wildlife (Hardcover)

Mr. Shedd brings wisdom & humor to his subject. It is a book that could be enjoyed by adults or read to small children. It's great to have a book that dispells so many myths.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Warner Shedd offers a new pair of glasses, November 21, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Owls Aren't Wise & Bats Aren't Blind: A Naturalist Debunks Our Favorite Fallacies About Wildlife (Hardcover)

Warner Shedd's book has deepened my whole family's enjoyment of the animals in our midst. We have read it to the kids before bed and shared it with company. After reading a chapter I feel as refreshed as I would after a leisurely stroll through the woods.

I live surrounded by red squirrels, but it was not until I read Owls Aren't Wise & Bats Aren't Blind that I could really see them. Shedd articulated what my peripheral senses have been barraged with all these years, and brought these cute rascals into focus for the first time.

Likewise, my rodent-phobic mother has grown positively fond of the muskrat who visits her suburban yard (It better stay out of the house though.). Shedd helped her identify the animal and understand what a positive contribution it made to her environment.

My son recently found a dead porcupine in the woods. Shedd's book got us looking at its quills under the microscope and equipped us to make an educated guess about its demise.