GROWING up as I did where adders—Britain’s only venomous
snake—were still fairly plentiful, and having spent many happy summer days
searching for and capturing them, I have no trouble understanding other people’s
enthusiasm for snakes. Unfortunately, this view is far from universal, so books
on other groups of animals—generally birds and large mammals—hugely
outnumber snake books. Recently there have been a few attempts to redress the
balance, notably Richard Shine’s Australian Snakes: A Natural History*,
which covered more ground than its title would imply and took an ecological
approach.

The latest offering is by Harry Greene, who is curator of herpetology at the
University of California, Berkeley. Greene’s work on the ecology and behaviour
of snakes in North and Central America is well known. Like Shine and others, he
relies heavily on information gathered by miniaturised telemetry equipment. This
technique has probably had more impact on the study of snakes than on other
groups of animals, because they are otherwise so secretive that little can be
learnt by direct observation. Largely as a result of studies of this type,
snakes’ lives are now seen to be far more complex and sophisticated than anyone
had guessed.

In this book Greene has managed to combine the roles of scientist, genial
teacher and raconteur successfully, giving the reader far deeper insights into
snake biology than any scientific paper can. By including personal anecdotes
that bridge the gap between scientist and enthusiast, he communicates his
passion for snakes and the places where they live. These digressions appear
unexpectedly throughout the book, just like one of his camouflaged
bushmasters.

The 16 chapters are grouped into three “superchapters”, or themes.
“Lifestyles” deals with biological concepts and how they affect snakes. All
serpentine life is here: classification, habitats, feeding, defence,
reproduction, evolution and more. “Diversity” gives accounts of families of
snakes.

Unlike many authors before him, Greene has resisted the temptation to dwell
on the more sensational snakes. Obscure groups, such as the blindsnakes,
pipesnakes and filesnakes (“stunningly homely, strictly aquatic inhabitants of
the Indo-Australian region”) generate just as much wonder as the boas, pythons
and cobras. This is the hallmark of a true enthusiast. Finally, “Synthesis”
discusses the driving forces behind snake evolution and dispersal, ending with
an account of the pressures on modern snake populations, their interactions with
people, snake conservation, and their prospects. In this last respect, Greene is
more optimistic than I am, which is probably to his credit.

The body of the book is interspersed with several short sections, each two to
four pages long, covering subjects that are peripheral to the main thrust of the
text, such as “Other elongate vertebrates”—an overview of the loss of
limbs among other vertebrate groups—and “The coral snake mimicry
problem”.These make interesting reading and are good for dipping into, rather
like having magazine articles to read alongside the book.

The 215 photographs, nearly all taken by Michael and Patricia Fogden, match
the text for quality and complement it perfectly. Many are straightforward
portraits, but there is not a bad one among them. Some are outstanding, such as
those of Peringuey’s vipers on the dunes of the Namib Desert, and eyelash pit
vipers coiled in rainforest vegetation in Central America.

The book as a whole conveys something of days and nights spent in the field
searching for snakes and trying to understand what makes them rattle. Greene’s
enthusiasm comes across throughout. Anyone who reads this book will learn a
great deal about snakes and about their habitats. Perhaps more importantly, they
will also learn why they so capture the imaginations of the people who study
them.

Irrespective of how they reproduce, amphibians make a considerable impact on ecosystems in places where they are common. The 4550 known species comprise approximately 4000 frogs and toads, 390 salamanders and 163 caccilians (a little-known group of burrowing or aquatic, eel-like amphibians restricted to tropical regions). Some amphibians are not only the most numerous vertebrates in some areas (an estimated 20 570 adult coqui frogs per hectare in parts of Puerto Rico), but may also constitute the greatest vertebrate biomass in certain habitats. They spend much of their time busily consuming vast numbers of small invertebrates, efficiently converting them into a succulent and substantial energy source, before passing it along the chain to their vertebrate predators such as snakes, birds and mammals.

The authors have dealt with these and other aspects of amphibians’ natural history in 20 chapters, each covering a different aspect of anatomy, physiology, behaviour and ecology. Every chapter is broken down into smaller topics, resulting in a series of concise accounts of the many facets of amphibians’ lives. The authors refer readers to more detailed studies – the references run to almost fifty pages. This format, though familiar to students and professional scientists, cannot be considered “an engaging introduction for general readers”, as the jacket blurb claims.

But the authors have been amazingly thorough: I was unable to find a single piece of amphibian biology that they had not addressed succinctly and accurately. Most of the examples are North American, a few are South American and Australian, but hardly any are African, Asian or European. Also, because there is no taxonomic synopsis, nor descriptions of actual animals, the text may not “come to life” for the render who is not already familiar with amphibians.

In the final chapter, the authors address the worldwide problem of declining amphibian numbers. They do this by citing case histories, all but two of which are frogs. Some species have probably become extinct in the past decade (the stomach-brooding frog Rheobatrachus silus from Australia and the golden toad Bufo periglenes of Costa Rica) and many that were formerly common have shown alarming declines over recent years (the western toad Bufo boreas from the western US and the leopard frog Rana piptens from the US and Canada).

This book has much to recommend it. It seems likely to replace Duellman and Trueb’s Biology of Amphibians as the standard text for students and researchers and will also be of interest to amateur naturalists who have a biological background. But not, I think, to the general reader.