Chasing Monarchs
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Migrating with the Butterflies of Passage
Robert Michael Pyle; Foreword by Lincoln P. Brower; New Afterword by the Author
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Format: PaperPrice: $20.00
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Pyle’s classic account of discovery along the migration trail of monarch butterflies is part natural history, part road trip adventure
Although no one had ever followed North American monarch butterflies on their annual southward journey to Mexico and California, in the 1990s there were well-accepted assumptions about the nature and form of the migration. But to Robert Michael Pyle, a naturalist with long experience in monarch conservation, the received wisdom about the butterflies’ long journey just didn’t make sense. In the autumn of 1996 he set out to uncover the facts, to pursue the tide of “cinnamon sailors” on their long, mysterious flight.
Chasing Monarchs chronicles Pyle’s 9,000-mile journey to discover firsthand the secrets of the monarchs’ annual migration. Part road trip, part outdoor adventure, and part natural history study, Pyle’s book overturns old theories and provides insights both large and small regarding monarch butterflies, their biology, and their spectacular migratory travels. Since the book’s first publication, its controversial conclusions have been fully confirmed, and monarchs are better understood than ever before. The Afterword for this volume includes not only updated information on the myriad threats to monarch butterflies, but also various efforts under way to ensure the future of the world’s most amazing butterfly migration.
Although no one had ever followed North American monarch butterflies on their annual southward journey to Mexico and California, in the 1990s there were well-accepted assumptions about the nature and form of the migration. But to Robert Michael Pyle, a naturalist with long experience in monarch conservation, the received wisdom about the butterflies’ long journey just didn’t make sense. In the autumn of 1996 he set out to uncover the facts, to pursue the tide of “cinnamon sailors” on their long, mysterious flight.
Chasing Monarchs chronicles Pyle’s 9,000-mile journey to discover firsthand the secrets of the monarchs’ annual migration. Part road trip, part outdoor adventure, and part natural history study, Pyle’s book overturns old theories and provides insights both large and small regarding monarch butterflies, their biology, and their spectacular migratory travels. Since the book’s first publication, its controversial conclusions have been fully confirmed, and monarchs are better understood than ever before. The Afterword for this volume includes not only updated information on the myriad threats to monarch butterflies, but also various efforts under way to ensure the future of the world’s most amazing butterfly migration.
Robert Michael Pyle is an award-winning author of eighteen books, including Wintergreen, for which he received the John Burroughs Medal. He is founder of the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation and has worked in every state and many countries as a butterfly ecologist, writer, speaker, and teacher. He lives along a tributary of the Lower Columbia River in southwest Washington.
Selected by America's WildRead book club. Starting March 1, 2015, follow the virtual book discussion online, moderated by the author, here.
“In his new book, ‘Chasing Monarchs,’ the naturalist Robert Michael Pyle chronicles his efforts to follow the monarchs on their winter migration by tracking them on the ground in a battered old Honda Civic. . . . The author’s evident passion for and understanding of butterflies invest his narrative with energy and interest.”—New York Times
“Natural history never went down easier.”—Kirkus Reviews
“Chasing Monarchs tells the engrossing story of his adventurous journey with these graceful wanderers—down the Columbia, Snake, Bear, and Colorado rivers, across the Bonneville Salt Flats, and through the Chiricahua Mountains to Mexico, returning north along the California coast. Part travelogue, part scientific study, Chasing Monarchs is one of the most fascinating books ever written about butterflies.”—Monarch News
“Pyle provides a deeply informed commentary that is an introduction to the natural history and lore of the monarch butterfly—the archetypal migratory species that has captured our imaginations—and extends to a larger story of why what happens to the monarch butterfly matters to us humans.”—Francie Chew, Tufts University
“Chasing Monarchs, like all of Bob Pyle’s books, is infused with grace, understanding, and an incredibly expansive knowledge of the world surrounding us.”—David Guterson, author of Snow Falling on Cedars
“Robert Pyle is one of America’s exceptional naturalists and one of its finest natural history writers. In this stylishly written book he tracks the monarchs’ spectacular migration from Canada to Mexico, describing not only the creatures that have captured his imagination but also his adventures along the way. Chasing Monarchs is Robert Pyle’s best book yet.”—Sue Hubbell, author of Waiting for Aphrodite and A Country Year
“Chasing Monarchs is at once an enchanting travel narrative and the most enchanting man-loves-butterfly story I’ve ever read.”—Lawrence Millman, author of Last Places
ISBN: 9780300203875
Publication Date: April 29, 2014
Publication Date: April 29, 2014
336 pages, 5-1/2 x 8-1/4
2 b/w illus.
2 b/w illus.
