THE ENDANGERED KINGDOM: The Struggle to Save...

THE ENDANGERED KINGDOM: The Struggle to Save America’s Wildlife by Roger L. DiSilverstro (John Wiley & Sons: $10.95, illustrated). A former editor at Audubon, DiSilvestro combines a concise history of the conservation movement with an account of the efforts to preserve the nation’s endangered animals, focusing on the curious link between hunters and conservation in 20th-Century America. By purchasing licenses, hunters supply a substantial portion of the money used to buy habitats and fund wildlife-management studies; yet hunters enjoy killing animals, which often puts them at odds with people who want to keep the gray wolf, wild turkey and pronghorn from joining the passenger pigeon, salt-ater mink and Steller’s sea cow in extinction. However, the greatest threat to American animals now comes from the destruction of their habitats through pollution, reckless development, draining swamps, cutting forests, etc.: In the last hundred years, California and Iowa have lost 95% of their wetlands.