What do you think?
Rate this book
An Island Called California. an Ecological Introduction to Its Natural Communities
Bakker's classic of ecological science now includes three new chapters on Southern California which make the book more useful than ever. Striking new photographs illustrate the diversity of life, climate, and geological formation.
Paperback
First published January 1, 1971
8 people are currently reading
163 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
August 31, 2012
I loaned the edition I once owned and it was never returned to me! I have borrowed this updated edition from my local library so that I could read it again and pick up on the new chapters. Elna writes in such a way that not only are you able to visualize the area she is writing about but the amount of information packed into a paragraph provides a total experience of all the life and natural beauty of California. From the pacific ocean to the Sierra Nevada Mountains her descriptions include all that exists and is possible.
January 18, 2016
California is one of the most fascinating states to explore. It is blessed with deserts, sea coasts, redwood forests and mountains. This book by Elna Bakker describes each ecological community in the state. I personally feel that every California high school student should be required to read this book prior to graduating!
Read
August 20, 2009Had to put this back on hold for a while.
January 19, 2018
I may be biased since my Ph.D. research is focused on the impacts of climate change on California and I've spent an immense amount of time out camping and hiking in California's natural communities both as part of my research and for fun, but I found this book to be absolutely delightful. California's ecology is complex and HIGHLY diverse - we have sand dunes and scorching deserts, towering forests (including the tallest, most massive, and oldest trees in the world - the redwood, the Sequoia, and the bristlecone pine, respectively) and marshlands. We have a variety of desert and coastal shrub communities, and we have grasslands. We have snow-covered peaks that number among the highest in the continental United States, and we have valleys that include the lowest point in the continental United States. This diversity of ecosystems contributes to the California Floristic Province boasting one of the greatest diversities of plant and animal life in the world.
In this book, Bakker breaks this down by community type and presents a good overview of and introduction to each of these communities. For each community, she describes the plants and animals characteristic of that community and gives an overview of the environmental factors that affect each community and the distribution of plants and animals within the community.
Bakker does assume some basic knowledge of ecology and geology on the part of the reader, but this should not deter you. If you've had any basic college course in ecology and geology, you're already familiar with the concepts she introduces, and if not, just google the words with which you are unfamiliar - none of the concepts are so complex that you couldn't familiarize yourself with them in a minute or two with a quick google search. Many are explained within the text as well.
I do suggest you keep a device with internet access handy when you read this book because you will often find yourself wondering what a particular plant or animal looks like. Google will again be your friend here, and looking up visual references as you go will help you immerse yourself deeper in the communities she describes.
The bottom line: I highly recommend this book to anyone who lives in California and wants to get a better sense of the natural world around them. I recommend it to anyone who wants to visit California, and to anyone who is at all curious to learn a little bit more about one of the most highly biodiverse regions on our planet.
In this book, Bakker breaks this down by community type and presents a good overview of and introduction to each of these communities. For each community, she describes the plants and animals characteristic of that community and gives an overview of the environmental factors that affect each community and the distribution of plants and animals within the community.
Bakker does assume some basic knowledge of ecology and geology on the part of the reader, but this should not deter you. If you've had any basic college course in ecology and geology, you're already familiar with the concepts she introduces, and if not, just google the words with which you are unfamiliar - none of the concepts are so complex that you couldn't familiarize yourself with them in a minute or two with a quick google search. Many are explained within the text as well.
I do suggest you keep a device with internet access handy when you read this book because you will often find yourself wondering what a particular plant or animal looks like. Google will again be your friend here, and looking up visual references as you go will help you immerse yourself deeper in the communities she describes.
The bottom line: I highly recommend this book to anyone who lives in California and wants to get a better sense of the natural world around them. I recommend it to anyone who wants to visit California, and to anyone who is at all curious to learn a little bit more about one of the most highly biodiverse regions on our planet.
October 17, 2024
Back in the late 1970s, when I was a budding ecology student, we used the 1972 edition of Island Called California as a textbook. Our instructor, a grad student, infused us with both science and poetic observation of nature as we trained to become docents at a California state park. Island was perhaps the model for how she combined these. I enjoyed the book, but never finished it. I thought I would give the 1984 edition a try, to better understand certain areas of California that I pass through on road trips.
Alas, in the revised and expanded edition author Bakker reorganized in a repetitive and slightly confusing format. For example, she leaves extended discussion of the conifers to the next-to-last chapter, yet discusses the lodgepole pine and other Sierra trees (fortunately) in her Sierras chapter. The latter chapter seemed like too much too late. Between the added species descriptions and the poetic phrasing, it adds up to too much information. Illustrations helped, but occurred less often than I’d like.
Best use would be to pick the chapters about the California regions with the reader is familiar. Otherwise, the long lists of species and poetic description can be overwhelming. In a 415-page book, frequent referral to the internet becomes cumbersome.
If this book were revised again today, it would be shorter and more logical. However, this would probably destroy a lot of the poetry of the language. I would stick with the 1972 edition, which is still available. One of my favorite passages, about squirrels and their feeding on redwood cones, was deleted in favor of expanded information. I might just have to reread the original.
Alas, in the revised and expanded edition author Bakker reorganized in a repetitive and slightly confusing format. For example, she leaves extended discussion of the conifers to the next-to-last chapter, yet discusses the lodgepole pine and other Sierra trees (fortunately) in her Sierras chapter. The latter chapter seemed like too much too late. Between the added species descriptions and the poetic phrasing, it adds up to too much information. Illustrations helped, but occurred less often than I’d like.
Best use would be to pick the chapters about the California regions with the reader is familiar. Otherwise, the long lists of species and poetic description can be overwhelming. In a 415-page book, frequent referral to the internet becomes cumbersome.
If this book were revised again today, it would be shorter and more logical. However, this would probably destroy a lot of the poetry of the language. I would stick with the 1972 edition, which is still available. One of my favorite passages, about squirrels and their feeding on redwood cones, was deleted in favor of expanded information. I might just have to reread the original.
February 17, 2024
Elna Bakker takes her readers on a journey across all the natural zones of California in her book An Island Called California. Each of the natural zones of the state is visited in this well written and detailed book. Beginning with the tide pools of the Central Coast the reader visits the Redwood forests, the coastal mountains, the Central Valley, the Sierra and Cascade mountains and finally the desert areas. Every aspect of each of these regions is covered, plants, animals, climate, geology and more. There is so much detail that a few pages felt tedious but I appreciate that this author didn't leave any thing out. I thought I knew a lot about natural California but I learned much more. This book has been on my shelves since I received it as a gift the year it was first published. I was still an undergrad. I finally read it in retirement. Though this book was written over 5o years ago it is still timely. Now if I could find a similar study of the natural world of the state I live in presently, New York.
January 10, 2024
I read the chapters on oaks and Joshua trees closely and made copies for BIOL 245W and the students that do research with my colleague Chris Smith. The rest of the book I skimmed and. Can recommend the animated prose for anyone that already knows a little bit about California natural history. It’s a 3 because it’s got limited references but there are some very fine line drawings of oak galls and a Joshua tree food web.
Format was hard cover interlibrary loan from University of Oregon.
Format was hard cover interlibrary loan from University of Oregon.
July 3, 2019
If you’re new to California or if you were born here this is a great book to explain so much of the natural history of the Golden State. Whether you read it from beginning to end or just chapters that interest you, do you want to keep this book on yourself as a reference source.
September 30, 2020
A little scattered but very well written and informative, even though it came out decades ago. A ((true)) introduction to ecology.
May 18, 2021
Great Synopsis
October 15, 2025
The best parts of California are the parts Californians haven't managed to ruin yet. An Island Called California is a decent primer on those parts. Unfortunately, it's a little too tedious to read right through, with many chapters devolving into mere lists of species. On the other hand, the book's organization and often vague chapter titles don't really lend it to use as a reference, either. I suppose your mileage will vary depending on your familiarity with the "communities" in question (and if you're not familiar at all, probably don't bother). Best chapter for me was "Patterns on the Hills," which laid out how the pieces of those patterns fit together in a way that changed how I look at some of the places I spend the most time hiking in.
The book's diagrams are usually excellent, but there could have been more of them. Color photos are usually a no-brainer for this sort of thing, but one could make the argument that a good black-and-white picture captures the atmosphere of the redwood forest more easily than all but the most masterly color photographers.
The book's diagrams are usually excellent, but there could have been more of them. Color photos are usually a no-brainer for this sort of thing, but one could make the argument that a good black-and-white picture captures the atmosphere of the redwood forest more easily than all but the most masterly color photographers.
November 13, 2012
Read this book a long time ago and was absolutely smitten. A real love letter about the land that makes up California.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews