Preface 



Natural history is the study of a single thing, 

 nature. Whether it is normally a science or an art is a 

 matter of debate, but there is no doubt about its 

 tremendous scope; all living and nonliving things, 

 their activities, and interrelationships. For practical 

 purposes, the things and their activities are often 

 separated into individual studies, field geology for 

 the nonliving and field biology for the living. In ad- 

 dition, the interrelationships constitute the field of 

 ecology. However, these separate studies have a 

 serious drawback — like an organism, nature as a 

 whole is much more than the sum of its parts. 



This book is written with the firm conviction that 

 field geology, field biology, and ecology can be in- 

 tegrated into a single meaningful study. Such an ap- 

 proach serves to unify previously disconnected subject 

 matter falling within courses designated as natural 

 history, natural science, nature study, general 

 science, field biology, and even ecology. 



Despite the number of textbooks, none really ex- 

 plores all areas of natural history. Yet, biologists, 

 elementary and secondary teachers, naturalists, and 

 interested laymen have expressed a need for a book 

 which is a unified treatment of the basic principles of 

 nature. The content and approach of this book stem 

 from my discussions with these individuals and my 

 own teaching experience. There was unanimous 

 agreement on the need to know how to identify liv- 

 ing and nonliving things and to determine their 

 interrelations and significance. Therefore this book 

 integrates the earth's physical features with life on 

 earth by emphasizing the interrelations of the two. 

 The subject matter proceeds from gross identification 

 and natural history of nonliving and then living things 

 to ecology. It is an exposition of nature based on 

 principles, rather than an exploration of theories and 

 the relative merits of each. There is coverage of much 

 material in depth, but the book is not intended 

 to replace publications which treat regional en- 



vironments, floras, or faunas, or special natural his- 

 tory of particular groups. 



A brief introduction to astronomy stressing the 

 earth's orientation within the solar system precedes 

 the study of the earth's physical features. The lab- 

 oratory work on this section leads from identification 

 of nonliving things to student exploration of the 

 physical environment, especially climatic factors, 

 land forms, rocks, and soils of local areas. 



The next group of chapters treats living organisms, 

 and stresses the broadest aspects of structure and 

 function, mostly in relation to distinctive features 

 and gross appearance; nutrition and, where ap- 

 propriate, food and feeding mechanisms; reproduc- 

 tion in reference to life cycle; and habitat and oc- 

 currence. Much of this information is provided in 

 synoptic form. Laboratory work on organisms starts 

 with identification and leads to field examination of 

 the kinds and natural history of life. The remainder 

 of the book examines the interrelations among or- 

 ganisms and between organisms and their environ- 

 ment and is supplemented by field studies. 



Evolution or its counterpart is the basic unifying 

 principle or the central theme of the book. The con- 

 cept of evolution of life is developed after many sim- 

 ilar phenomena in nonliving things have been il- 

 lustrated. Each major group of living things is in- 

 troduced through its role in the general scheme of 

 evolution, and even when evolution is discussed as a 

 separate topic, it continues as the unifying concept. 

 Ecology, also, is examined within this framework, and 

 a large part of community discussion is of the origin 

 and evolution of communities. In addition, ecology 

 serves to integrate further the field geology and field 

 biology sections. 



The book is suitable for a full year course which 

 has no prerequisite. However, the contents are 

 adaptable to shorter courses for beginning students 

 or for advanced students. The beginning students 



