Wildlife management is the sum of activities, policies, cultural practices, and laws and rules of governments and private citizens whereby a society provides for itself the amount and kind of wildlife that meets its perceived needs. The Philosophy and Practice of Wildlife Management, written by 2 well-known Canadian wildlife professionals of long experience, provides a broad overview of this many faceted field in which facts, history, and wisdom are interleaved in a manner that is both interesting to read and insightful. The book is aimed at the young biologist contemplating an education and career in wildlife management. However, it is worthwhile reading for a much larger audience, including veterinarians with professional or avocational interests in wild animals. It is not a “how to” book or training manual, but rather a review and contemplation of the global human enterprise with respect to wildlife.
The book consists of an introduction, 12 chapters and an epilogue. Throughout, the focus of the book is wildlife management of vertebrate animals in Canada and the United States. The coverage of Canada is exceptionally thorough. The sequence of chapters is logical and helpful for those reading the book from beginning to end, but each chapter can be understood independently from the others, making this a useful reference book for the topics covered.
Chapters 1 through 3 review the history and evolution of the practice of managing wild animals and of the societal values that have shaped that practice, including those of aboriginal peoples in North America. Chapters 4 through 9 cover the aspects of animal biology, including disease (a full chapter), that generally have proved to be important in determining management approaches and possibilities, as well as the full range of actual approaches that are taken in managing wildlife: managing habitat, managing individual species, and managing on the basis of societal demand. The 3 final chapters address management issues associated with endangered species, the history and nature of environmental impact assessment; international issues, including management approaches that differ markedly from those in use in North America; and the complexities of wildlife management in developing countries with burgeoning human populations.
The authors are personally dedicated to wise use, conservation, and perpetuation of wild species and their habitats into the future. Nonetheless, they generally are balanced and fair to all parties in their treatment of the many complex management issues that they cover. They urge the reader to fully understand all sides in a dispute and the perspectives of the differing parties. But they also urge wildlife biologists to be unrepentant and indefatigable advocates for wildlife and to recognize this as their particular social and professional obligation.
This is the 3rd and final edition of this book; the authors state there will be no 4th edition. Some parts of it have been fully updated to about 1997, while other parts clearly reference earlier events and times. It is easy to find small annoyances in the book associated with this uneven updating; for example, some of the disease accounts are quite dated. However, this is to quibble over trivia. For veterinarians, it is exhilarating to find a full 42 pages, 12% of the book, dedicated to disease as a critical biological factor in wildlife management. Throughout, the broad picture that the authors portray is the essence and excellence of the book, and this picture is not affected much by small details that do not square with the latest molecular findings.
The book ends on an ominous note of near despair. In the epilogue, the authors express their anguish that the press of human population expansion, with its attendant expropriation of all possible lands and resources, will eliminate their profession and their life's work by eliminating any possibility of wildlife management and conservation. Demographic arithmetic and all current trends are distinctly in this direction. There is an intergenerational pathos in this closing sentiment, wise warriors at the end of long years of hopeful hard work in the trenches scanning a bleak horizon and fearing for the welfare of their youngest comrades in arms and the cause they serve.