Publisher's Note:
Adventures and Misadventures in the Great Canadian Forest is a collection of thought-provoking says presenting the environmental effects of clearcut logging, changing wildlife habitats, and the extinction of plant species in a clear, straightforward manner. He gives a holistic view of current trends of over-logging old growth forests and increasing dependence on less diverse and less valuable second growth-tree plantations. In his introduction to this relevant and topical book, Ben Parfitt outlines the argument that resurfaces again and again in his essays. 'We need a greater diversity of approaches to managing our forests and our fish. The more alternatives we have, the more we can learn about what does and does not work in sustaining communities both human and wild.' Parfitt compares Ontario's 'Lands for Life' process with British Columbia's initiative to protect twelve-parent of its land as wilderness, and details how human industry continues to encroach upon animal and fish habitats, significantly altering their chances for Survival. From the section entitled 'Using and Abusing the Land, ' Parfitt exemplifies the caribou as one species whose natural existence is threatened. 'something as seemingly benign as snowshoe tracks or a cross-country ski trail creates a path for wolves to hunt down caribou. Other forms of human activity, especially logging roads and clear cuts, have long-term consequences that often prove devastating for the caribou.' These essays also look at environmental effects of logging, mills, off drilling, the production of natural gas, and multiple-use watersheds in British Columbia, Alberta, and Ontario. Forest Follies puts the fragile conditionof Canada's forests into perspective. Ben Parfitt draws on a variety of sources -- people who live and work in the forest, biologists, academics, Native peoples -- and explains the state of our forests today, and what their future will be if current practices of resource management and forest policy continue. He also offers hope and possible solutions for the viability of sustainable land use for humans and animals. Forest Follies is must reading for anyone who wants balanced, pertinent, up-to-date information on what's gone wrong in Canada's forests and how we can find creative solutions to our current forestry crisis.
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