Animal Science

Does your dog get sad when you leave for the day? Does your cat purr because she loves you? Do bears attack when they’re angry? You can’t very well ask them. In fact, scientists haven’t been able to reach a consensus on whether animals even have emotions like humans do, let alone how to study them. Yet studies of animal emotion are critical for understanding human emotion and mental illness. In The Nature of the Beast, pioneering neuroscientist David J. Anderson describes a new approach to solving this problem.

We share our lives, for better or worse, with a multitude of animals: white-tailed deer and white-tailed eagles, hens and wrens, frogs and guppies, and, last but hardly least, bugs and bacteria. For the most part, we drift along separately, with neither man nor animal affecting the other's way of life. Sometimes, however, we fall in love - as in the case of the cat in the title - or otherwise encounter our animal neighbors in ways that change both of us.

Eleven-year-old Ruby is a Black girl who loves studying insects and would do just about anything to be an entomologist, much to the grossed-out dismay of her Gramma. Ruby knows everything there is to know about insects so when she finds the weirdest bug she’s ever seen in her front yard, she makes sure no one is looking and captures it for further study. But then Ruby realizes that the creature isn't just a regular bug.

Delving into evolution, anthropology, sociology, biology, veterinary science, and zoology, they break down the walls between disciplines, redefining the boundaries of medicine. Zoobiquity explores how animal and human commonality can be used to diagnose, treat, and heal patients of all species. Both authoritative and accessible, offering cutting-edge research through captivating narratives, this provocative book encourages us to see our essential connection to all living beings

Who builds lodges? Who creates amazing towers? Who digs burrows? You’re invited to visit the different homes that animals build.

Who dives for food, and who traps food? Who hunts in packs, and who picks food using their tongue? Dig in to find out how animals eat.

Jacqueline Briggs Martin’s Snowflake Bentley won a Caldecott Medal, a Parents’ Choice Award, and was picked as an ALA Notable Book for Children. Listeners of all ages will cherish this beautiful story about a real man whose discoveries changed the way the world saw snow.

Ten years have passed on Tines World, where Ravna Bergnsdot and a number of human children ended up after a disaster that nearly obliterated humankind throughout the galaxy. Ravna and the pack animals for which the planet is named have survived a war, and Ravna has saved more than one hundred children who were in cold-sleep aboard the vessel that brought them. While there is peace among the Tines, there are those among them - and among the humans - who seek power. And no matter the cost, these malcontents are determined to overturn the fledgling civilization....

The nefarious lion-tamer Maccomo, recently escaped from captivity, kidnaps Charlie with the intention of selling him and Rafi to the Corporacy! A full-scale chase ensues as Charlie's parents, his Venetian gondolier friend, and his ever-faithful lions pursue Maccomo's ship across the sea.

Sylvester is a rock collector. One day he finds a magic pebble that makes wishes come true. He rushes home to share his good fortune with his parents. On the way, he’s frightened by a hungry lion and quickly asks the pebble to turn him into a rock, so the lion can’t eat him. It works - but there sits Sylvester on Strawberry Hill with no way to hold the pebble to wish himself back into a donkey. Seasons come and go as Sylvester’s parents desperately search for him....

In Robo-Dodo Rumble, Koko Dodo's cookie shop is facing some stiff competition from an evil robotic dodo (a Robo Dodo). The Robo Dodo is selling its cookies for only a penny! Why? To put Koko's shop out of business! And if that weren't bad enough, a giant sea monster starts destroying the town! But don't worry. Didi Dodo has a daring plan.

For centuries, the dietary needs of dogs were a secondary consideration. Our loyal companions, domesticated from wolves, lived on scraps from human meals, whatever was available and convenient at the time. In rural communities, a dog’s diet might have included leftovers, bones, and whatever they could scavenge. There was little thought given to balancing nutrients, matching caloric needs to activity levels, or preventing diet-related diseases. The invention of commercial dog food in the mid-19th century marked a pivotal shift.

Who burrows in the mud, and who hangs from a ceiling? Who snoozes in hollow trees, and who sleeps in dark caves? Curl up and find out where different animals hibernate.

Long ago, the land of Ulv was filled with magic. But that was before a wolf ate all the stars in the night sky, ridding the world of magic and allowing Shadow Creatures, beasts made of shadow and evil, to flourish. Twelve-year-old Bo knows the stories but thinks the Stars and the wolf who ate them are nothing more than myths - until the day Bo's guardian, Mads, is attacked by a giant wolf straight from the legends.

Young Tepary Jones leads a life of constant adventure. But he gets more excitement than even he can handle when he plays a flute he finds in an ancient ruin. Magic from the Distant Time changes him into a bushy-tailed woodrat and ensnares him in a world of danger and suspense. His parents don’t realize what’s happened to him - only his dog Dusty knows. With Dusty alone to protect him from nightly predators, Tepary must unravel the mystery behind the owner of the flute - Kokopelli himself.

Ever since she discovered her affinity for magic, 17-year-old Anouk has been desperate to become a witch. It's the only way to save her friends who, like Anouk, are beasties: animals enchanted into humans. But unlike Anouk, the other beasties didn't make it out of the battle at Montelimar in one piece. With her friends now trapped in their animal forms, Anouk is forced into a sinister deal involving a political marriage with her sworn enemy, a wicked plot to overthrow London's fiercest coven of witches, and a deadly trial of fire to become a witch.

In The Other Animals, a worm breaks up with a snail, a vulture contemplates the act of killing, a whale falls in love with a song, and more. This funny, moving collection of stories - written by a crew of scientists, literary writers, and comics, and informed by animal behavioral science - explores what animal perspectives can show humans about the world.

Did you know there are over 400 different species of sharks? Did you know they have been on Earth much longer than humans, and even lived before the dinosaurs? Here you'll learn all about these fearsome kings of the ocean, including their eating habits and the basics of their anatomy. Sharks come in many sizes, from under a foot long to over 40 feet - and that's not even counting the long-extinct, 60-foot-long Megalodon shark. And while some have been known to bite people, they are usually quite content to hunt other sea creatures.

Jonathan Safran Foer spent much of his teenage and college years oscillating between omnivore and vegetarian. But on the brink of fatherhood - facing the prospect of having to make dietary choices on a child's behalf - his casual questioning took on an urgency His quest for answers ultimately required him to visit factory farms in the middle of the night, dissect the emotional ingredients of meals from his childhood, and probe some of his most primal instincts about right and wrong.

The world is more astonishing, more miraculous, and more wonderful than our wildest imaginings. In this brilliant and passionately persuasive book, Katherine Rundell takes us on a globe-spanning tour of the world's most awe-inspiring animals currently facing extinction. This urgent, inspiring book of essays dedicated to 23 unusual and underappreciated creatures is a clarion call insisting that we look at the world around us with new eyes.