The Badgers of Wytham Woods: A Model for Behaviour, Ecology, and Evolution

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    The Badgers of Wytham Woods: A Model for Behaviour, Ecology, and Evolution Authors: , Format: Hardback First Published: Published By: Oxford University Press
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    Pages: 592 Illustrations and other contents: 272 line figures and colour photographs Language: English ISBN: 9780192845368 Categories: , , , , , ,

    The badgers of Wytham Woods (Oxford, UK) have been studied continuously and intensively by David Macdonald for almost 50 years (25 of them with his former student and co-author Chris Newman), generating a wealth of data pertaining to every facet of their ecology and evolution. Through a mix of accessible, highly readable prose and cutting-edge science, the authors weave a riveting scientific story of the lives of these intriguing creatures, highlighting the insights offered to science more broadly through badgers as a model system. They provide a paradigm – from population down to molecule – for a deeper understanding of mammalian behaviour, ecology, epidemiology, evolutionary biology, and conservation. The real value of this long-term study is particularly apparent with current and globally relevant challenges such as climate change, disease epidemics, and senescence. This unique dataset enables us to examine these issues in a context that only a half-century experiment can reveal.

    The Badgers of Wytham Woods will appeal to a broad audience of professional academics (especially carnivore and mammalian biologists), researchers and students at all levels, governmental and non-governmental wildlife bodies, and to the natural historian fascinated by wild animals and the remarkable processes of nature they exemplify.

    Weight1.402 kg
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    The 19 chapters comprehensively address behavior, population ecology, and the effects of disease and weather on the European badger, and make appropriate comparisons with the other five genera of the world's badger species. During the study, life history data was recorded on over 1,800 individuals. Given the size of the study population and time depth of the study itself, there should be no surprise that such an enormous amount of information is presented in one volume. * Choice * This book is the product of 50 years of David's and 30 years of Chris's study of badgers in an Oxfordshire wood. You can find anything you want to know about badgers in this book, and it is written in a way that wealth of detail is not intimidating. * Keith Somerville, The Shepherd *

    Author Biography

    Professor David Macdonald CBE has been Director of the Wildlife Conservation Research Unit at Oxford University since founding it in 1986, and is also Senior Research Fellow in Wildlife Conservation at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. He began research in Wytham Woods in 1972, and has been studying badgers since then. In 1986 he began the routine annual sampling of badgers which is the foundation of this book. A recent survey by BBC Wildlife magazine listed him amongst the ten most influential living conservationists, and he has twice been awarded the Natural History Author of the Year. Chris Newman joined the Wildlife Conservation Unit at Oxford University in 1991, spending 15 years living on-site in the heart of Wytham Woods which gave him unprecedented access to the 300 badgers that shared his garden. In 2019 he moved to Novia Scotia to work as an independent ecological consultant.