Waiting for the Macaws and Other Stories from the Age of Extinctions

Janet Arnett is the former campus manager of adult education at Ontario’s Georgian College. She is the author of Antiques and Collectibles: Starting Small, The Grange at Knock, and 673 Ways to Save Money.

You may think you know about extinction; you’ve heard about the dodo
and the passenger pigeon. The reality is these two “poster” species
don’t even begin to hint at the scope of the problem of “bleeding
away of diversity.”

This is a book about extinctions beyond most of our imaginations, about
the massive, widespread loss of wildlife, languages, religions, and
intellectual traditions. Glavin, an award-winning author of five books
and numerous articles on environmental issues, takes a travelogue
approach to highlight the extinction crisis unfolding today. During the
20th century, some 30,000 plant species became extinct. Today, one in
eight bird species, one in four mammals, one in three amphibians, and
half of all fish species are threatened with extinction. And
approximately 34,000 plants species are endangered. This unprecedented
loss of biological diversity is the result of many factors, including
deforestation, habitat loss, the damage done by introduced species, and
human’s “ignorance, greed and utter disregard for fellow species.”
To illustrate his theories and explore causes, Glavin writes about the
trade in exotic birds, whaling in Norway, the North Atlantic cod
fishery, the sale of endangered fish species in Russia and China, apple
varieties, tigers, and much more.

To balance the tale of destruction, he looks at efforts to save
selected species and to protect ecosystems, as well as attempts at
sustainable use of natural resources. He acknowledges the good, if not
always appropriate, intentions of the breeding programs conducted at
some zoos, the seed-savers movement, and the collections of samples of
large numbers of species, such as at Kew Gardens.

Yet the bottom line is that we are experiencing the “unravelling”
of the biological and cultural diversity of the world, the creation of a
planet fit only for “weedy” species (rats and pigeons are thriving).

Although the urgency of his subject would surely justify it, Glavin’s
style is never hysterical or haranguing. With remarkable calm and
patience, he visits the sites, reviews the background, and gently points
to the impact on the global picture.

The book should be mandatory reading for everyone in the developed
world.