West Southwest: Vertebrate Life in Southern California [Paperback]

West Southwest: Vertebrate Life in Southern California celebrates an amazingly diverse fauna with description, evolutionary background, geographic insight, and ecological detail. Southern California is a vast region of very different habitats  all with an abundance of unique species of plants and animals and all within a days drive. Southern California shares an evolutionary history with other areas of the Southwest, but it has its own identity. The book is not a field identification guide. Instead, the book provides the evolutionary history of species groups, details where the individual species occur and their habitat preferences, and how they avoid the perils of predation and human impact.

 

Key Selling Features:

• Summarizes the evolutionary background and ecology of southern Californias vertebrates: freshwater fish, amphibians, turtles, snakes, lizards, birds and mammals.
• Reviews the history of southern Californias biotic communities from the coast to the deserts and their association with other areas of the Southwest.
• Discusses vertebrate design and how it affects performance and lifestyle.
• Extends and enhances the content of regional field identification guides.
• Includes 120 maps, figures and color plates.

Section IFundamentals Chapter 1 The Land Chapter 2 The Climate Chapter 3 Exploration, Collections and the Museum Tradition Chapter 4 The Three Pillars of Natural History Section IISettings Chapter 5 Vegetation Past and Present Chapter 6 PlantVertebrate Communities Section IIIVertebrates Chapter 7 Amphibians Chapter 8 Turtles and an Overview of the Amniotes Chapter 9 LepdiosaursSquamates and Tuatara Chapter 10 Birds Chapter 11 Mammals Chapter 12 lÓ%