ANIMAL RESCUE: Saving Our Endangered Wildlife

by William Wise ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 18, 1978

The eleventh-hour preservation of species headed for extinction is the theme of Wise's animal roundup, though he begins with the negative example of Stellar's sea cow which died out just a few years after its discovery in 1741. Happier endings appear to be in the offing for the American buffalo, pronghorn antelope, prairie dog, beaver, and sea otter in North America, and for the Russian saiga, Pere David's deer (a Chinese reindeer preserved in English and American zoos), vicuna, koala, rhinoceros, orangutan, and Bengal tiger elsewhere--plus at least some of the African animals lumped together here in a general report on the Serengeti and other reservations. Though Wise mentions human individuals who have furthered the cause--William Hornaday of the Bronx Zoo who was active around the turn of the century in behalf of the buffalo in paticular and conservation in general; the Grzimeks, a European father and son who mapped the Serengeti wilderness in the late 1950s--this is more a summary-style status report than a story of their campaigns. Most if not all of the animals cited are well covered in juvenile books either separately or in other contexts; Wise's brevity, scope, and distribution maps give this a homework utility.

Pub Date: July 18, 1978

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Putnam

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1978

Categories: NONFICTION