The Enchanted Canopy by Andrew W Mitchell

 

Subtitled "Secrets from the Rainforest Roof" this classic from the mid 1980s celebrates the wildlife of tropical rainforests around the world. Mitchell (currently director of the Global Canopy Programme) was a pioneering arboreal naturalist, as such he was influential in developing methods for studying the rainforest canopy, by constructing walkways close to the tops of the trees. 

This beautifully written and lavishly illustrated book looks at many aspects of rainforest ecology, from the relationships between pollinators and plants to the sex lives of Orang-utans to the mystery of the Calvaria tree in Mauritius, which were all ageing and unable to produce a new generation because their seeds had originally been eaten and then excreted by the Dodo, it was eventually found that the turkey had a similar enough digestive system and so the Calvaria was saved from extinction.

Mitchell clearly shows how understanding the relationships between different organisms can be of significant benefit, not only to securing the future of the rainforests, but also in enabling local agriculture to thrive: "In the past, tropical Brazil nut farmers wondered why their trees' multi-million dollar crop began to fail, until it was shown that the carpenter bees responsible for pollinating the Brazil nut trees had vanished along with the forest that used to surround the plantation."

It is notable, that even writing in 1986, Mitchell was well aware of the fragility of rainforest ecosystems, writing, for example, that in the USA: "Olive sided Flycatchers and Grey Vireos have dropped about four to eight percent every year since 1966. It seems almost certain that this is due in large part to the destruction of forests in South America, currently estimated at over four million hectares annually." He also expands on the need for arboreal naturalists to fulfil their quest to understand the 'most complex exhibition of life on earth'.

Yet tropical rainforests are still being destroyed across the world....

This is a beautiful and fascinating book that does somehow feel like entering a lost world.

The Enchanted Canopy by Andrew W Mitchell published 1986 by William Collins.