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With documentation and photographs from virtually every major canopy site, Moffatt delivers a vivid and comprehensive picture of tropical rainforest life and the perilous challenges its research presents scientists.

From Library Journal

A tree-climber when young, Moffett has combined his early agility with his doctoral rain forest research to write a fascinating account of the fauna of the rain forest canopy. It has been only in the last 20 years that biologists have been able, through a variety of techniques, to get up into the canopy, often 100 to 200 feet above the forest floor, and study the teeming animal life there. Moffett visited most of the researchers now active in this very special field. He mixes the science in an interesting way, offering glimpses into the life and research methods of these biological specialists. Illustrated with many spectacular photographs taken by the author and written in a very readable style, this book will be of interest to both the biologist and general reader.

- Eleanor Maass, Maass Assocs., New Milford, Pa.

Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

Scientists have only just begun to explore the biology of the tropical rainforest canopy. In The High Frontier, Mark W. Moffett provides an elegantly written account of the ecology of this aerial continent. The book is packed full with his stunning--and often unusual--photographs of canopy architecture, animals and plants, taken while accompanying tree-climbing researchers working at study sites worldwide. (Nature)

Mark Moffett's book is a magnificent exploration of the most biodiverse environment known--the rainforest canopy--supported by the finest colour photographs I have ever seen. Almost a decade has passed since I wrote The Enchanted Canopy...Moffett charts the explosion of new discoveries since then and the emergence of a new breed of arboreal naturalists...The High Frontier comprises a series of insightful encounters with scientists working in a wide range of disciplines to uncover the secrets of the canopy...The book really comes to life in the examples of how many animals and plants interact. Good journalistic narrative is at all times underpinned with first-hand knowledge and the authority of excellent research...Moffett's book is a visual feast. Some of his photographs are breathtaking...This remarkable book will be another stepping stone on the way to taking canopy science seriously. As Cousteau once predicted research stations under the sea, so I envisage, in the not-too-distant future, permanent research stations in the canopy to study the ocean of life a mere 100 feet above our heads. (Andrew Mitchell Times Higher Education Supplement)

Moffett presents his personal vision of tropical rain-forest canopy biology, a science in its infancy; it is a product of Moffett's trips to five continents, where he interviewed and worked alongside scores of the tree-climbing biologists who are exploring this unique and rapidly vanishing terrain. The result is a stunning mixture of adventure, nature photography and hard scientific inquiry that ranks with the best work of Jacques Cousteau. (Robert Crawford Boston Globe)

Moffett's own research has often been financed by The National Geographic, and a single glance at this beautiful, large-format book shows why. He is a superb photographer, able to capture, while dangling from a rope or balanced on a branch, vignettes of life at the top...[Moffett] says that he hopes people will see, from his book, that these environments are so rich, so valuable, that they will be moved to protect them. I only hope that this is true. (Jonathan Beard New Scientist)

Review

This book is a tour de force of scientific journalism as well as the visual and literary expression of an experienced and deeply caring naturalist." E. O. Wilson (E. O. Wilson)

Dr. Mark W. Moffett, called "the Indiana Jones of Entomology" by the National Geographic Society, is a tropical ecologist and research associate at the Smithsonian Institution and the Department of Human Evolution at Harvard with a passion for discovering new species and behavior in remote part of the world. Mark has sat on a deadly snake in Peru, been chased up trees by Indian elephants, defended himself with a blowgun in Colombia, been lost in Borneo and New Guinea, walked into Afganistan from Iran, seen 100 foot wide army ant swarms in the Congo, and placed a scorpion on Conan O'Brien's head. For Mark, nothing is better than a good story that presents a deep understanding of the world; his goal is to have people fall in love with the unexpected in nature, whether that's learning about the architecture of a rainforest or the life and death of societies.

Mark has the Lowell Thomas Medal from the Explorers Club, the Distinguished Explorer Award from the Roy Chapman Andrews Society, Yale University's Poynter Fellowship in Journalism, Harvard's Bowdoin Prize for writing, and numerous international awards in photography. His website is http://www.doctorbugs.com

Edward O. Wilson is Pellegrino University Professor, Emeritus, at Harvard University. In addition to two Pulitzer Prizes (one of which he shares with Bert Hölldobler), Wilson has won many scientific awards, including the National Medal of Science and the Crafoord Prize of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.