Just because I really can’t be bothered writing anything of substance today and because I have this book awaiting a review and because I’ve mentioned a rant coming on about this book and also because I had to have a break from Australis Imaginarium (a fantastic book but I want to eek out the fantasticness so I stopped and read something else) I’m reviewing another Gerald Durrell book.

This is another in the series of autobiographical books written by Gerald Durrell to help support the Jersey Wildlife Preservation Trust. Durrell was a seriously amazing man, he started being interested in wildlife from a very early age and some of his books written about his family show just how interested he was, his room was apparently awash with all sorts of animals, birds, insects and spiders. This book is dedicated to showing us the state of conservation of fauna in New Zealand, Australia and Malaysia in the mid 1960s.

Things have changed tremendously since that time and yet in some ways they haven’t changed at all. In the 1960s the Jersey Wildlife Preservation Trust was the only organisation in the world dedicated to preserving wildlife, to ensuring that wildlife of all kinds were not made extinct and to ensuring their zoo developed breeding programmes for all sorts of animals and birds that were heading for extinction. Nowadays we have so many organisations and I’d suggest that all zoos are dedicated to breeding programmes to ensure extinction doesn’t happen. I’ll just mention a few and if you want to put more into the comments section that’d be good too. We’ve got WWF, World Land Trust and Greenpeace, I’ve chosen these three in no particular order and for no particular reason than that I remembered them, there are a large number of other organisations like these and you can donate money to them or donate your time and energy I’m sure they need more of both.

I’m not going to detail the number of species that were in danger at the time this book was written and show you which ones are now extinct and which are no longer in danger due to the breeding programmes as that would take more time than I have available, it would also not be a review of the book. I’m sure you are aware of some of the fauna that are endangered at present, the whales being fairly high in people’s thoughts.

Now, to the book. Durrell came out to the southern hemisphere with his wife, Jacqui, and a modest film crew to document conservation in this area, most specifically in New Zealand, Australia and Malaysia. Having said that he was only out here for a few weeks and really could not be expected to see everything so if your area is not mentioned then it doesn’t mean conservation wasn’t actually happening there just that he didn’t have enough time. While here he saw some amazing sights and shot some fabulous footage, including getting footage of a live kangaroo birth, one of the first pieces of footage filmed of this amazing creature. He also managed to see the Wrybill in New Zealand which is an amazing bird which seems to walk around in packs while also staying in the same place, you’d have to read the passage to understand, it also has a bent bill. He also managed to film a Leathery Turtle laying eggs and watched the conservation techniques at work.

On with the rant. This is a wonderful book, it is one in a series of wonderful books by the same author but I take exception to this one due to it’s poor proofreading. Durrell is in Melbourne, talking out about Lyrebirds and is taken out to Sherwood Forest to see them and to film them. At this point I was almost shouting in distress as it’s not Sherwood, but Sherbrooke. I’ve been there so many times, I’ve fed the Rosellas (even though you’re not meant to feed them as it makes them lazy) and I’ve seen Lyrebirds there on a number of occasions, one very special occasion we even stopped for several minutes and recorded two Lyrebirds competing in song, one up in the forest on one side of the path and the other down in the forest on the other side of the path – a truly amazing experience. But why couldn’t the proofreader have got it right? Just digressing a little, there’s a fair chance I was actually there on the day he filmed only I wouldn’t remember as I would have been fairly young at the time, I recall visiting there with my family on a number of occasions. I’ve even seen an Echidna there.

Anyway, if you can put aside the proofing of this book then I thoroughly recommend it as it’s a great read.