Chasing Kangaroos: A Continent, a Scientist, and a Search for the World's Most Extraordinary CreatureThe internationally acclaimed author of The Weather Makers crafts a love letter to his native land and one of its most unique inhabitants: the kangaroo. Drawing on three decades of travel, research, and field work, Tim Flannery shows us how the destiny of the extraordinary kangaroo is inseparable from the environment that created it. Along the way he uses encounters with ancient aboriginal cultures, eccentric fossil hunters, farmers, scientists, kangaroo advocates, and kangaroo hunters, to explore how Australia’s deserts and rain forests have shaped human responses to the continent—and how kangaroos have evolved to handle the resulting challenges. Ultimately, Chasing Kangaroos is a captivating blend of memoir, travel, natural history, and evolutionary science—and further proof of Flannery’s “offhand interdisciplinary brilliance” (Entertainment Weekly). “Absorbing, funny, and wonderfully learned.” —Bill Bryson, New York Times–bestselling author of A Walk in the Woods |
Contents
The Last of the Frontier | |
Of Nailtails and Nailed Tyres | |
Kangaroo Essence | |
Deadend in the Inland | |
The Oldest Kangaroo | |
Skeletons in the Dead Centre | |
Where the Great Roos Came From | |
The Age of Kangaroos | |
Advancing with Feet or Stomach? | |
Grass for the Kangaroos | |
Not Formed for Such Work | |
Land of Giants | |
The Mystery of Hopping | |
The Brightest Place on Earth | |
Is the Answer | |
World Conquest | |
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Chasing Kangaroos: A Continent, a Scientist, and a Search for the World's ... Tim Fridtjof Flannery No preview available - 2007 |
Common terms and phrases
Aboriginal ancestors ancient animals Arnhem Land arrived Australian Museum banded hare wallaby bettongs bike bones burrowing bettong bush camp cave continent creatures Creek dating desert dingo dinosaurs discovered discovery eastern grey kangaroos environment euro European evolution extinct fauna fossil deposits fossil record fossils giant grass Groote Guinea habitat herbivores hopping human ice-age island joey kangaroo family kilometres known Lake Eyre Lake Pinpa land lineage look macropodines male Marree marsupial lion marsupials megafauna Melbourne metres million years ago Murgon musky rat-kangaroo nailtail Nullarbor numbers once oolacunta opal outback palaeontologists Paruna perhaps placental mammals plains possum pouch premolars Procoptodon Propleopus Protemnodon Queensland quokka rabbits rainforest rat-kangaroo region remains revealed Riversleigh rock rock-wallabies sand Sandy scientists sediments seen sheep short-faced kangaroos skeletons skull species specimen survived Sydney tail Tasmanian teeth thylacine tree-kangaroos vanished Victoria western young