Blake's stunning photography reveals the remarkable diversity of life and terrain within the lands along the U.S.-Mexico border; Steinhart's inspired text provides environmental awareness and an understanding of the role that humans have played. Together they offer a reminder that the region's human and natural history cannot be separated. Two kinds of experiences await the reader in this moving and beautiful book—those for the eye and those for the mind. Tupper Ansel Blake's stunning photography reveals the remarkable diversity of life and terrain within the lands that lie along the United States-Mexico border; Peter Steinhart's inspired text provides regional history, environmental awareness, and an understanding of the role that humans have played there. The 2,000-mile swath shared by the United States and Mexico is often dismissed as one of worthless scrub, or as a hostile no-man's-land populated by border patrols and furtive immigrants. It is in fact among the richest, most biologically diverse, and most endangered areas in all of North America. Tropical and temperate zones overlap in the borderlands—ocelots and parrots, black bears and elk all make their homes there. It is a region not just of cactus and mesquite, but of pine forests, oak woodlands, lush grasslands, and riverside groves of cottonwood and sycamore. Equally diverse are the people of the borderlands, many of whom share a long heritage of living with the land without despoiling it. If our political view of the borderlands has hidden from us its beauty and fragility, then Two Eagles/Dos Aguilas will reopen our eyes. The recent North American Free Trade Agreement is a reminder that the region's human and natural history cannot be separated, and that the political boundary between the two nations casts a long shadow over the bald eagle of the United States and the caracara, the eagle of Mexico.

Two Eagles / Dos Aguilas: A Natural History of the United States–Mexico Borderlands

Arts & Photography

Steinhart, Peter

Blake, Tupper Ansel

Photography & Video

University of California Press

The Klamath Basin is a land of teeming wildlife, expansive marshes, blue-ribbon trout streams, tremendous stretches of forests, and large ranches in southern Oregon and northern California. Known to waterfowl, songbirds, and shorebirds, the Klamath Basin's marshlands are a mecca for birds along the Pacific Flyway. This gorgeously illustrated book is a paean to the beauty of the Klamath Basin and at the same time a sophisticated environmental case study of an endangered region whose story parallels that of watershed development throughout the west. A collaboration between two photographers and a writer, Balancing Water tells the story in words and pictures of the complex relationship between the human and natural history of this region. Spectacular images by Tupper Ansel Blake depict resident species of the area, migratory birds, and dramatic landscapes. Madeleine Graham Blake has contributed portraits of local residents, while archival photographs document the history of the area. William Kittredge's essay on the conjunction of conflicting interests in this wildlands paradise is by turns lyrically personal and brimming with historical and scientific facts. He traces the water flowing through the Klamath Basin, the human history of the watershed, and the land-use conflicts that all touch on the availability of water. Ranchers, loggers, town settlers, Native Americans, tourists, and environmentalists are all represented in the narrative, and their diverse perspectives form a complicated web like that of the interactions among organisms in the ecosystem. Kittredge finds hope in the endangered Klamath Basin, both in successful restoration projects recently begun there, and in the community involvement he sees as necessary for watershed restoration and biodiversity preservation. Emphasizing that we must take care of both human economies and the natural environment, he shows how the two are ultimately interconnected. The Klamath Basin can be a model for watershed restoration elsewhere in the west, as we search for creative ways of solving our intertwined ecological and social problems.

Balancing Water: Restoring the Klamath Basin

Business & Money

Kittredge, William

Blake, Madeleine Graham

Economics

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Books by Blake, Tupper Ansel