Introduction to the Natural History of Southern Ca

Contents: Introduction; Physical description; Climate; The seasons; The plant world; The animal world; Naming plants and animals; Life zones and biotic communities; Biotic communities in southern California; The community of nature; Nature activities; Museums, zoos, and botanical gardens; Where to obtain help; Suggested references; Index / Edmund Carroll Jaeger, D.Sc. (1887 - 1983) was an American biologist known for his works on desert ecology. He was born in Nebraska and moved to Riverside, Calif., in 1906 with his family. He was the first to document a state of extended torpor, approaching hibernation, in a bird, the common poorwill. He also described this in the National Geographic magazine. Jaeger first attended the newly relocated Occidental College in Eagle Rock (in 1914) but moved to Palm Springs in 1915, where he taught at the one-room schoolhouse. At Palm Springs he met artist Carl Eytel and authors J. Smeaton Chase and Charles Francis Saunders. These men formed what University of Arizona Professor Peter Wild called a "Creative Brotherhood" that lived in Palm Springs in the early 20th century. Other Brotherhood members included cartoonist and painter Jimmy Swinnerton, author George Wharton James, and photographers Fred Payne Clatworthy and Stephen H. Willard. The men lived near each other (like Jaeger, Eytel built his own cabin), traveled together throughout the Southwest, helped with each other's works, and exchanged photographs which appeared in their various books. He then returned to Occidental to complete his degree in 1918 and started teaching at Riverside Junior College. Retiring from teaching after 30 years, he worked the Riverside Municipal Museum. During all these years Jaeger used his Palm Springs cabin for his research trips across the desert. Throughout his career he wrote many popular nature books and became known as the "Dean of the California deserts".