The Portland Audubon Book Club meets in the Portland Audubon Interpretive Center on the third Wednesday of every month for a fun and informal discussion.
Pick up your copy of the month’s book in the Nature Store for a 20% discount to members. The book club is open to everyone! To see updates, as well as current and upcoming books, visit our Meetup page.
Interested? Please RSVP to Pat Gorman at gormanp@gmail.com.
Once They Were Hats: In Search of the Mighty Beaver, by Frances Backhouse
Beavers, those icons of industriousness, have been gnawing down trees, building dams, shaping the land, and creating critical habitat in North America for at least a million years. Wherever there was wood and water, there were beavers — 60 million (or more) — and wherever there were beavers, there were intricate natural communities that depended on their activities. Then the European fur traders arrived.
In Once They Were Hats, Frances Backhouse examines humanity’s 15,000-year relationship with Castor canadensis, and the beaver’s even older relationship with North American landscapes and ecosystems. Backhouse takes us on a journey of discovery to find out what happened after we nearly wiped this essential animal off the map, and how we can learn to live with beavers now that they’re returning.
