Charles Fergus - Böcker

The Wingless Crow joins together thirty-three superb short essays on nature, science, country living, and self. They are written by a man who—watchful, inquisitive, at times prickly—is animated by delight, wonder, and love for the rural places and wildlife of Pennsylvania. Charles Fergus wrote these insightful pieces for his monthly column, "Thornapples," which ran in Pennsylvania Game News magazine from the late 1970s until the early 1990s. They are based on many hours spent hiking, skiing, botanizing, and observing wild creatures, as well as trips to libraries and hours spent with books, teasing out information about the objects of his interest. The writing is simple and vivid, rendered dramatic through the delivery of carefully chosen details. Fergus scrutinizes a captured dragonfly and sees "a bubble of a hide through which organs glimmer." He recalls a night in a tent when lightning shook the ground. He tells about topographic maps and deerflies and auctions and poisonous mushrooms and crows. Propelled by an unrelenting curiosity, a wry sense of humor, and the tough heart of a born curmudgeon, Fergus is astonished at how little he sees at first—and how much, with care and dedication, there is to see. Readers will delight in his observations of and insights into the everyday life, both human and wild, animating the wooded mountains and farmed valleys of the author's central Pennsylvania home.

Make a Home for Wildlife helps you see your property in new ways and is the resource you need to take the sometimes daunting steps to improve the quality of your land.According to U.S. Forest Service, 250 million acres of woods and forests in the United States are privately held by 10 million individuals/families. Whether you live on a quarter-acre lot in the suburbs, own a 20-acre woodland retreat, run a farm of 100 acres, or belong to an outdoor club with hundreds or thousands of acres, you can make changes to the land—improvements that will turn your property into a better home for wildlife. Habitat projects can be simple or complex, short-term or spanning decades. Cost can be minimal—a few hours of your time spent doing pleasant work in the outdoors—or can run into the hundreds or thousands of dollars. And there is funding to help landowners make wildlife habitat.Focusing on the eastern US from Canada to Florida and west to the Great Plains, this book describes basic habitat types—forest, shrublands, grasslands, and wetlands—and highlights over 150 select native and introduced trees, shrubs, and plants, explaining how they are used—or not—by wildlife. The book includes more than 100 profiles of prominent and interesting species of insects, reptiles, amphibians, birds, and mammals with information on animals and their habitat needs. Large and small mammals, resident and migratory birds, and insects are covered. Fergus relates stories of landowners who have made habitat in different states and regions in different ways.

A Hunter's Book of Days is a personal narrative set in the grouse and woodcock covers surrounding Fergus's longtime home in Pennsylvania. The author focuses his text around bird hunts behind his springer spaniels, including flashbacks to Jenny, a quintessential gun dog, and Caillie, his up-and-coming youngster. But A Hunter's Book of Days is far more than a chronicle of sporting memories: Within the book's chapters, Fergus deals with the loss of covers, land development, and life-altering events all neatly linked to thoughts on dogs, guns, bird hunting, love of home ground, and friendship.

A beautifully written natural history of the more than seventy tree species that grow in New England. Includes detailed illustrations and range maps.