Fuzz: Examining How Nature Breaks the Rules

Kindle Customer: Unless you have an interest in solving the Man vs rats, geese or lions, this book can be very dull.

United States on Nov 13, 2023

P. Curtis Yoncis: Bought as a gift for a usualy picky reader (read engineer), and they LOVED it! This book and others by this author are definitely worth a look. Would gift again.

United States on Sep 14, 2023

#EmptyNestReader: A 5 star book that takes an around-the-world look at the crossroads where humans and animals meet. And when they do meet, the erratic, often unforeseeable, things that happen. ”For most of the past century, your odds of being killed by a cougar were about the same as your odds of being killed by a filing cabinet. Snowplows kill twice as many Canadians as grizzly bears do.” We don’t outlaw snowplows, or filing cabinets. What are we to do about the “wildlife problem”? “The black bear is a ridiculously lovable species. There's a reason kids have teddy bears, not teddy goats or teddy eels.”

Science writer Mary Roach takes a deep dive into the human-animal conundrum. What do we do when grizzly bears are breaking into homes - and refrigerators? Seagulls are uprooting pots of flowers and randomly scattering the floral displays meant or the Pope’s Easter mass? Sacred monkeys terrorize Indian citizens?
“I can’t judge” says Roach. "We all have emotional connections to certain branches of the tree of life, and for some that branch is trees. We are irrational in our species-specific devotions. I know a man who won’t eat octopus because of its intelligence....

United States on Aug 08, 2023

GTnH: Very well written. Many examples of problems humans encounter dealing with nature and how we usually mess it up when we try to solve them.

United States on Jul 07, 2023

Gayle Shaw: Even mediocre Mary Roach is better than most books

Australia on Jan 11, 2023

Frederick S. Goethel: Mary Roach is one of my favorite authors because she digs into normally untouched subjects and investigates, and then writes with eloquence about those subjects. Here she approaches wild animals that do now want to be told what to do or how to do it.

For instance, monkeys are a huge problem in India. What do you do to control them when the public hates them and wants you to control them, but they are also considered sacred. Killing them off isn't the answer, so let's look at birth control. Humorous you think, but it might just be the way to create a less harmful group of monkeys. However, because the monkeys are wild, you can't use any stitches which they would pull out. To find the really answer, you have to read the book.

Throughout the book she looks at a number of species that present this unusual problem. Some solutions, such as topping of dead tress is pretty easy (comparatively speaking) but others are much more dangerous and difficult to control. Take elephants, for instance. You have food, they want the food and nobody with a brain is going to tell the elephant no. So how do you keep them from tipping over a mud house looking for the food?

There are...

United States on Feb 12, 2022

Amazon Customer: There are a ton of very interesting facts in this book. The best part is that they are presented clearly and with humor. I was drawn in by the author's unique style and stayed for the interest level. Well done!

Canada on Jan 03, 2022