An Indomitable Beast
The Remarkable Journey of the Jaguar
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- $6.99
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- $6.99
Publisher Description
The jaguar is one of the most mysterious and least-known big cats of the world. The largest cat in the Americas, it has survived an onslaught of environmental and human threats partly because of an evolutionary history unique among wild felines, but also because of a power and indomitable spirit so strong, the jaguar has shaped indigenous cultures and the beliefs of early civilizations on two continents. In An Indomitable Beast: The Remarkable Journey of the Jaguar, big-cat expert Alan Rabinowitz shares his own personal journey to conserve a species that, despite its past resilience, is now on a slide toward extinction if something is not done to preserve the pathways it prowls through an ever-changing, ever-shifting landscape dominated by humans. Rabinowitz reveals how he learned from newly available genetic data that the jaguar was a single species connected genetically throughout its entire range from Mexico to Argentina, making it unique among all other large carnivores in the world. In a mix of personal discovery and scientific inquiry, he sweeps his readers deep into the realm of the jaguar, offering fascinating accounts from the field. Enhanced with maps, tables, and color plates, An Indomitable Beast brings important new research to life for scientists, anthropologists, and animal lovers alike. This book is not only about jaguars, but also about tenacity and survival. From the jaguar we can learn better strategies for saving other species and also how to save ourselves when faced with immediate and long-term catastrophic changes to our environment.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The jaguar, the largest extant cat in the Americas, is far more ancient than humans but, as Rabinowitz (Life in the Valley of Death) shows, its fate has been inextricably linked to humans ever since we arrived in the Western Hemisphere. Rabinowitz, CEO of the conservation organization Panthera, argues that human "health and well-being" is equally dependent on the jaguar: "This belief, this human-jaguar linkage, was... as important to the cultural fabric of the people as it was to the jaguar's struggle for survival." He combines his account of field research on jaguars in the wilds of Belize and Brazil and advocacy for conservation strategies with anthropology, zoology, and paleontology to tell the tale of an endangered species that has persisted despite very long odds. Surprisingly, as Rabinowitz himself notes, biologists now believe that jaguar populations stretching from Mexico to South America comprise a single interbreeding species rather than eight subspecies as previously thought. This insight has dramatically altered how jaguar conservation biology must be practiced and supports a need to maintain a jaguar corridor throughout their entire range. Rabinowitz's work with Panthera on this front is impressive and provides some hope for the survival of the species.
