Writer Profile
Books & Essays
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Title:
Bayou-Diversity: Nature and People in the Louisiana Bayou Country
Date Published:
LSU Press 2011Description:
Louisiana's bayous and their watersheds teem with cypress trees, alligators, crawfish, and many other life forms. From Bayou Tigre to Half Moon Bayou, these sluggish streams meander through lowlands, marshes, and even uplands to dominate the state's landscape. In Bayou-Diversity, conservationist Kelby Ouchley reveals the bayou's intricate web of flora and fauna.
Through a collection of essays about Louisiana's natural history, Ouchley details an amazing array of plants and animals found in the Bayou State. Baldcypress, orchids, feral hogs, eels, black bears, bald eagles, and cottonmouth snakes live in the well over 400 bayous of the region. Collectively, Ouchley's vignettes portray vibrant and complex habitats. But human interaction with the bayou and our role in its survival, Ouchley argues, will determine the future of these intricate ecosystems.
Book Review #1:
It is hard to imagine an ecology book as a page turner, but that is exactly what Ouchley delivers to his reader, who will be steered from story to story as masterfully as if the writer were poling a pirogue past alligators...Ouchley's Bayou-Diversity is a fitting addition to the great tradition of Louisiana naturalists. The Ouachita Citizen
Book Review #2:
"Kelby Ouchley has given us an unforgettable collection of essays on the natural history of Louisiana. Nothing escapes his attention: ticks, lightning, stray cats, oil spills, sluggish water, snakebite myths and remedies, the origin of his great-grandmother's rocking chair. At the heart is an acute understanding of Louisiana ecology--how it works and should work. The essays are beautifully written: thermal wind currents are 'bubbles of air that serve as elevators for raptors.' In five paragraphs, Ouchley completely changed my understanding of teeth. I haven't enjoyed or learned so much about the natural history of a place since I read Aldo Leopold's A Sand County Almanac."--Phillip Hoose, National Book Award-winning author of The Race to Save the Lord God Bird
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Title:
Flora and Fauna of the Civil War: An Environmental Reference Guide
Date Published:
LSU Press 2010Description:
During the Civil War, humans impacted plants and animals on an unprecedented scale as soldiers on both sides waged the most environmentally destructive war ever on American soil. Refugees and armies alike tramped across the landscape foraging for food, shelter, and fuel. Wild plants and animals formed barriers for armies and carried disease, yet also provided medicine and raw materials necessary to implement war, greatly influencing the day-to-day life of soldiers and civilians. Of the thousands of books written about the Civil War, few mention the environment, and none address the topic as a principal theme. In Flora and Fauna of the Civil War, Kelby Ouchley blends traditional and natural history to create a unique text that explores both the impact of the Civil War on the surrounding environment and the reciprocal influence of plants and animals on the war effort.
The war generated an abundance of letters, diaries, and journals in which soldiers and civilians penned descriptions of plants and animals, sometimes as a brief comment in passing and other times as part of a noteworthy event in their lives. Ouchley collects and organizes these first-person accounts of the Civil War environment, adding expert analysis and commentary in order to offer an array of fascinating insights on the natural history of the era.
After discussing the physical setting of the war and exploring humans' attitudes toward nature during the Civil War period, Ouchley presents the flora and fauna by individual species or closely related group in the words of the participants themselves. From ash trees to willows, from alligators to white-tailed deer, the excerpts provide glimpses of personal encounters with the natural world during the war, revealing how soldiers and civilians thought about and interacted with wild flora and fauna in a time of epic historical events.
Collectively, no better sources exist to reveal human attitudes toward the environment in the Civil War era. This one-of-a-kind reference book will spark widespread interest among Civil War scholars, writers, and enthusiasts, as well as environmental historians.
Book Review #1:
"In this unique and excellent compendium, Ouchley clearly demonstrates that nature played an integral part in the daily lives of Civil War participants, civilian and military. Well researched and clearly organized, Flora and Fauna of the Civil War will prove to be an invaluable research tool not only for students of the Civil War, but also for those interested in the natural history of the South."--Lisa Brady, contributor to Environmental History and the American South: A Reader
Book Review #2:
"In this unique and excellent compendium, Ouchley clearly demonstrates that nature played an integral part in the daily lives of Civil War participants, civilian and military. Well researched and clearly organized, Flora and Fauna of the Civil War will prove to be an invaluable research tool not only for students of the Civil War, but also for those interested in the natural history of the South."--Lisa Brady, contributor to Environmental History and the American South: A Reader
Book Review #3:
"...Kelby Ouchley's Flora and Fauna of the Civil War is a welcome addition to the growing field of Civil War environmental studies. It will be a useful source for scholars interested in the complex and often contradictory relationships between humans and nature in wartime."
-Journal of Environmental History, July 2011
Book Review #4:
I am encouraged when the occasional fresh look at the war comes along...Yes, I am recommending, very strongly, a reference guide, one that is thorough, witty, and full of insights from a fresh perspective on the effect of environment on soldiers and the effect of soldiers on environment. --Baton Rouge Advocate, August 2011
Book Review #5:
Few [Civil War] works will reflect such labor and love...[it] provides engaging environmental, economic, social, and cultural insights into the lives of the soldiers...Highly recommended. --P.D. Thomas, Wichita State Univ.; Choice Reviews Online
Book Review #6:
Falling somewhere between a reference text and a collection of thoroughly annotated personal anecdotes, this book combines dual disciplines to form a new study of environmental history.. Still, his text is filled with environmental lessons. --Tennessee Libraries 61:2, 2011