Walking with Beasts

by tim-haines

Book by TIM HAINES

Genres: Nonfiction, Science, Palaeontology, Animals, History, Reference, Nature

240 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2001

Reviews

[Philip]

Brilliant companion to the 2000 BBC series of the same name, with each chapter here lining up with an individual episode of the show. Like most similar projects, this show/book focuses on a series of "stories" — a family of "terror birds," a herd of mastodons, a pride of saber-toothed cats, etc. — around which are woven the "bigger picture" of life during each particular time, (progressing from 49 million, 36 million, 24 million, 3.2 million, 1 million, and finally a mere 30,000 years ago).

I am always amazed at (and confused by) the level of detail scientists present when discussing the lives of extinct animals, although I keep falling back on the words "speculation" and "conjecture" when reading passages like these:

"Although the youngsters will learn to hunt from her, she will never kill prey for them…"

"The shape of her huge body is difficult to make out under her speckled black feathers, but there is no mistaking her livid red facial features and pale beak…"

"The smilodons roar can carry for over five miles across the savannah…"

Really? And are you sure they laid a "single large blue-green egg"? But of course, it is such detail that brings these stories to life — and maybe scientists really are that smart in pulling such truths out of scant fossil evidence.

Anyway, great stuff. Being tied to the show, most of the pictures here are screen shots or stills from the series, which is fine but clearly points out just how far CGI has come in the past quarter century. And some of the science is also similarly out of date, as new discoveries are always refining if not totally changing perceptions of how individual animals looked, theories surrounding the mass megafauna extinctions, etc. But still worth a read if you can find a copy, as there are hidden gems throughout: discovering that Germany's famous Messel shales fossil deposits just barely survived a 20 year battle to turn it into a garbage pit; how extinct mammal exhibits were all the rage in Europe and America between 1870-1900, until they were replaced almost overnight by the larger and more-recently discovered dinosaurs.

PRODUCTION NOTE: If you look at the other editions of this book, you'll see that the original cover showed two large entelodonts facing off against each other. However, on subsequent editions one of these has been replaced by a saber-toothed cat… which okay, is inaccurate by several million years, but much cooler than just showing two pigs fighting!

[Rixt]

Boekversie van één van m'n favoriete documentaires van vroeger, love it (soms wel een beetje raar vertaald vanuit het Engels naar NL)

[Hayley]

I enjoyed the graphics and the facts in this book. Though, I've had it since it was released and am ashamed to say I've only got to reading it now

[Daniel Wright]

Walking with Beasts was a worthy if unoriginal sequel to Walking with Dinosaurs. The book of the series carries the same standards of scientific and narrative explanation and excellent graphical detail.

[Sam]

Beautifully illustrated with useful and easyly read text, a good accompaniment to the tv series with a bit more detail on each of the species seen and their supposed habits