Author: Noel Van RooyenPublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 222
Book Description
Flowering Plants of the Kalahari Dunes
Author: Noel Van RooyenPublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 222
Book Description
Field Guide to Wild Flowers of South Africa
Author: John ManningPublisher: Penguin Random House South Africa
ISBN: 177584675X
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 1539
Book Description
This fully updated edition of Field Guide to Wild Flowers of South Africa covers more than 1,100 species of flora, focusing on the most common, conspicuous and ‘showy’ plants around the region. An informative introduction discusses plant diversity, vegetation types, and includes a key to identifying plant groups. The species descriptions follow and each is accompanied by: a vivid photograph; a distribution map showing range, and an indication of the plant’s flowering season. This invaluable, up-to-date guide provides the tools and information needed to identify flowering plants across South Africa. Written by an expert in the field; fully updated edition; facilitates identification of wild flowers around South Africa; glorious full-colour photographs of each species; key to plant families for easy ID.
Field Guide to Wild Flowers of South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland
Author: John C. ManningPublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 514
Book Description
This book describes some 1,200 of southern Africa's diverse and beautiful wild flowers, highlighting the most conspicuous and those most likely to be encountered.
Homeland
Author: Karin BrynardPublisher: Penguin Random House South Africa
ISBN: 1415209812
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 650
Book Description
Captain Albertus Beeslaar has had enough of the Kalahari. He is about to hand in his resignation, but before doing so he is sent into the heart of an ancient San community: an elder has died after being released from police custody and the San blame the police. The small town of Witdraai borders on the world-famous Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, where the last of the Kalahari San eke out a living. A violent attack on a German tourist has unsettled the whole town – a case that is rubbing up Beeslaar’s new colleague, Colonel Koekoes Mentoor, the wrong way. She wants to turn her back on Witdraai and the bad memories the place holds for her. As the heat rises, all hell breaks loose: a policeman is murdered; deep-seated corruption is threatening a major land-restitution plan for the San; and a mysterious killer is prowling the red dunes. Amid all the controversy, Kytie Rooi, a cleaner at a luxury guesthouse in Upington and self-appointed protector of a strange street child, is fleeing into the deadly heat of the desert with her charge. In this world, places of safety are dangerously elusive. Homeland is the translation of the Number One Bestseller Tuisland, Karin Brynard’s critically acclaimed and most ambitious novel to date.
Wild Flowers of Southeast Botswana
Author: Gwithie KirbyPublisher: Penguin Random House South Africa
ISBN: 1775841359
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 404
Book Description
Review by Alexander McCall Smith: “The beauty of Botswana’s wild flowers is something that always strikes the visitor to that beguiling country. These plants, though, have all the subtlety and delicacy of dry-land vegetation. They are not always obvious and dramatic; they may be tucked away and visible only when one gets up close. Gwithie Kirby’s Wild Flowers of Southeast Botswana is a magnificent introduction to these beautiful plants. This is a book that anybody who visits Botswana will surely treasure.” Wild Flowers of Southeast Botswana features 332 of the most common wild flower species occurring in the region. The species have been grouped into nine sections based on the predominant colour of the flower, and a quick visual guide is provided for quickly locating them. Each species account features simple descriptions of the plant, its leaves, flowers and fruit, as well as attractive colour photographs, icons and simple leaf drawings. A nod to the cultural significance of each flower is provided via inclusion of Setswana common names, as well as a ‘Notes’ box, in which the traditional uses of the plants are provided.
Kalahari Cheetahs
Author: Gus MillsPublisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0191020117
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 288
Book Description
The cheetah, the fastest terrestrial animal, has widespread appeal amongst wildlife biologists and enthusiasts alike. However, like all all large carnivores, it is increasingly threatened by habitat loss and its status is now classified as 'Vulnerable' by the IUCN. This is the first comprehensive study of cheetah biology in an arid environment, a major component of its current distribution range. The book brings together results from an intensive six year study of the cheetah by the authors in the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park in South Africa and Botswana. It documents a wealth of detailed and direct observations of cheetah population biology and behavioural ecology, adopting an evolutionary approach and providing a conceptual framework for future research and applied management in the context of global environmental change. Kalahari Cheetahs covers topics such as optimal foraging theory, hunting strategies and predator prey relations, mating systems and reproductive strategies and success, inter-specific competition, demography, social organisation, and population limitation. Comparisons with previous cheetah studies reveal the variability of ecological determinants on behaviour, and the behavioural flexibility and ability of these carnivores to adapt to different environments. This advanced textbook is suitable for graduate level students as well as professional researchers in felid behavioural ecology and conservation biology. It will also be of relevance and use to conservationists, wildlife managers, and African wildlife enthusiasts.
Weeping Waters
Author: Karin BrynardPublisher: Penguin Random House South Africa
ISBN: 0143531611
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 573
Book Description
Inspector Albertus Beeslaar has left the ruthless city, only to have his hopes of finding peace and quiet in the Kalahari shattered by the brutal murder of artist Freddie Swarts and her adopted daughter. But Freddie’s journalist sister Sara is not convinced that this was a typical farm attack. Amid a spate of stock thefts, Beeslaar must solve this high-profile crime, all the while training his two rookie partners, Ghaap and Pyl. After more murders, the disturbing puzzle grows increasingly sinister, as age-old secrets and hostilities surface, spurring the local inhabitants to violent action. No one is above suspicion, not least the mysterious Bushman farm manager and falconer, Dam. Weeping Waters is Maya Fowler and Isobel Dixon’s translation of the Afrikaans bestseller Plaasmoord, a novel that peels away the layers of a landscape steeped in conflict, and hails the arrival of a bright new voice in South African crime fiction available in English.
Heart of Dryness
Author: James G. WorkmanPublisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 0802719619
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 336
Book Description
"We don't govern water. Water governs us," writes James Workman. In Heart of Dryness, he chronicles the memorable, cautionary tale of the famed Bushmen of the Kalahari--remnants of one of the world's most successful civilizations, today at the exact epicenter of Africa's drought--and their remarkable, widely publicized battle over water with the government of Botswana, to explore the larger story of what many feel is becoming the primary resource battleground of the 21st century: water. The Bushmen's story may well prefigure our own. Even the most upbeat optimists concede the U.S. now faces an unprecedented water crisis. Large dams on the Colorado River, which serve 30 million in 7 states, will be dry in 13 years. Southeast drought cut Tennessee Valley Authority hydropower in half, exposed Lake Okeechobee's floor, dried $787 million of Georgia's crops, and left Atlanta with 60 days of water. Cities east and west are drying up. As reservoirs and aquifers fail, officials ration water, neighbors snitch on one another, corporations move in, and states fight states to control shared rivers. Each year, inadequate water kills more humans than AIDS, malaria, and all wars combined. Global leaders pray for rain. Bushmen tap more pragmatic solutions. James Workman illuminates the present and coming tensions we will all face over water and shows how, from the remoteness of the Kalahari, a primitive (by our standards) people is showing the world a viable path through the encroaching desert of the coming Dry Age.
Small Carnivores
Author: Emmanuel Do Linh SanPublisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1118943287
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 592
Book Description
Small Carnivores: Evolution, Ecology, Behaviour, and Conservation This book focuses on the 232 species of the mammalian Order Carnivora with an average body mass 21.5 kg. Small carnivores inhabit virtually all of the Earth's ecosystems, adopting terrestrial, semi-fossorial, (semi-)arboreal or (semi-)aquatic lifestyles. They occupy multiple trophic levels and therefore play important roles in the regulation of ecosystems, such as natural pest control, seed dispersal and nutrient cycling. In areas where humans have extirpated large carnivores, small carnivores may become the dominant predators, which may increase their abundance ("mesopredator release") to the point that they can sometimes destabilize communities, drive local extirpations and reduce overall biodiversity. On the other hand, one third of the world's small carnivores are threatened or near threatened with extinction. This results from regionally burgeoning human populations' industrial and agricultural activities, causing habitat reduction, destruction, fragmentation and pollution. Overexploitation, persecution and the impacts of introduced predators, competitors, and pathogens have also negatively affected many small carnivore species. Although small carnivores have been intensively studied over the past decades, bibliometric studies showed that they have not received the same attention given to large carnivores. Furthermore, there is huge disparity in how research efforts on small carnivores have been distributed, with some species intensively studied and others superficially or not at all. This book aims at filling a gap in the scientific literature by elucidating the important roles of, and documenting the latest knowledge on, the world's small carnivores. p"This is a book that has been needed for decades. It is the first compendium of recent research on a group of mammals which has received almost no attention before the early 1970s. This book covers a wide range of subdisciplines and techniques and should be considered a solid baseline for further research on this little-known group of highly interesting mammals. As our knowledge regarding how ecosystems function increases, then the valuable role of small carnivores and the necessity for their conservation should be regarded as of paramount importance. The topics covered in this book should therefore be of great interest not only to academics and wildlife researchers, but also to the interested layman."
The Ecology of Desert Communities
Author: Gary A. PolisPublisher: University of Arizona Press
ISBN: 0816552452
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 470
Book Description
"Provides interesting and thought-provoking reading and is highly recommended to anyone interested in desert ecosystems or community ecology. The book . . . should serve as an inspiration to many for future research."—Journal of Biogeography "This book is not just about deserts; it is an update of the contributions that research in desert systems is making to community ecology. . . This book will provide a useful reference for desert ecologists, as well as indicate critical directions where progress needs to be made."—Ecology "This important book fills a significant gap in previous syntheses by presenting a detailed series of reviews of current understanding of community patterns and structure in desert environments. . . . Each chapter is thorough and well written and . . . closes with a discussion of suggested future research. . . . [T]hese ideas will do much to focus interest on the importance of desert systems in understanding community. Thus, this book has interest well beyond desert ecologists alone."—BioScience "Valuable reading and reference for ecology students, teachers and researchers."—Quarterly Review of Biology