The Beast in the Garden: A Modern Parable of Man and Nature FROM THE PUBLISHER
The time: the late 1980s. The place: Boulder, Colorado. When residents report cats as massive as African leopards in their yards and driveways, it becomes clear that mountain lions (cougars, pumas, panthers) are repopulating the land, rebounding after decades of persecution and bounty hunting.
To inhabitants of the environmentally aware city of Boulder, the lions' return is cause for celebration - initially. As the massive cats take up residence among houses and feast on pets, the animals' presence turns ominous, provoking political battles and culminating in the unthinkable - the death of a young athlete, hunted by a lion behind a nearby high school.
David Baron chronicles Boulder's struggles to coexist with its wild neighbors and reconstructs the paved-with-good-intentions path that led to Colorado's first recorded fatal mountian lion attack. The book reveals the subtle yet powerful ways in which human actions are altering wildlife behavior, and it demonstrates that the death in Colorado signaled the start of a worrisome trend - one that continues today.
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
In 1991, in Idaho Springs, Colo., a small town not far from Boulder, a young jogger was killed and partially eaten by a mountain lion. Although people were horrified, biologist Michael Sanders and naturalist Jim Halfpenny were not surprised. Since 1988 they had been studying the mountain lions that were invading backyards in the Boulder area in increasing numbers and had concluded that, contrary to the accepted wisdom that these lions don't attack people, the big cats were indeed stalking humans in search of a good meal. In an engrossing book that reads like a true crime thriller, Baron, a science and environmental writer, follows the advance of mountain lions around Boulder as if they were serial killers, building tension as he leads up to the killing. There were plenty of warnings. Numerous homeowners saw lions in their yards, dogs were maimed or eaten and a girl was attacked but survived. Sanders and Halfpenny tried to convince the wildlife-loving Boulderites that a tragedy was about to occur, but people believed they could coexist peacefully with the lions, and the Colorado Division of Wildlife was also determined to leave the animals alone. Even after Scott Lancaster, the Idaho Springs jogger, was killed, area residents refused to endorse killing the big cats that moved into their neighborhoods. Baron is not in favor of killing unwanted lions, but in this timely book he warns that as people continue to displace wild animals from their habitats, they have to change the way they interact with them and be more realistic about romantic notions of wilderness. Illus. not seen by PW. Author tour. (Nov.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal
By the late 1980s, the suburbs of Boulder, CO, had spread so far into previously undeveloped areas that residents began seeing mountain lions cross their backyards and cul-de-sacs. The lions pursued deer whose population had risen thanks to a live-and-let-live attitude by many homeowners. Soon the animals also learned that family dogs were an easy meal, but only after a woman was mauled and a teenager killed in lion attacks did the state of Colorado and the citizens of Boulder-who had disagreed for years on how to handle wildlife in residential areas-agree on the severity of the situation. In his engaging first book, Baron, a science correspondent for National Public Radio, describes the cougar sightings, habits, and encounters that surprised the town. While the historical asides and interviews with attack victims are interesting, it is the philosophical differences between longtime Boulder residents and urban transplants that make this a "modern parable." Appropriate for most public libraries, especially in communities where the urban is increasingly clashing with the wild. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 8/03.]-Alvin Hutchinson, Smithsonian Inst. Libs., Washington, DC Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
A thoughtful history from environmental reporter Baron elegantly forewarns of the mountain lion's return to human-populated landscapes. "Animal behavior is malleable, and a community of people . . . can exert a powerful, cumulative effect on wildlife," writes the author. This is especially so in the ecotone, the transition zone between land types, often biologically rich and often the site of uneasy mingling between creatures that are typically separate. There will be some strange edge effects as behavioral patterns adapt; and if one of the two creatures fails to sense a need to adapt, Baron cautions, the consequences may not be pretty: "A cat's prey preferences are not hard-wired." The for-instance here is Boulder, Colorado, where mountain lions are threading themselves into the expanding human environment. Dogs and humans, once thought to be relatively immune to mountain lion attack due to historical animosity, have become prey to a creature that was formerly timid in their presence. Boulder has long prided itself as living gently on the land, and the community's response to the lions, Baron predicts, will soon be replicated as the carnivore's range expands, with one side for, one side against the animals, and the middle ground left unmapped. It is a privilege to live among the cats, but humans are active agents within their environments, and the author suggests that a targeted approach to troublesome mountain lions may be in order. Following the thought-line of William Cronon (Changes in the Land, 1984, etc.), Baron writes, "if nature has grown artificial, then restoring wildness requires human intervention." Many will concur, though his point that "we must manage nature in order toleave it alone" takes a next step that lies open to discussion. Convincing argument that the return of the big carnivores will sharpen the debate over how humans situate themselves in the environment—at least, it certainly should. (3 illustrations, 2 maps, not seen) Agent: Todd Shuster/Zachary Shuster Harmsworth
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