Description
– male digger bees compete to succeed in virgins underground throughout the early summer mating season;
– the round-tailed ground squirrel goes about its business, sounding alarm calls when danger threatens its kin;
– the big-jawed beetles Dendrobias mandibularis emerge in time to feast on saguaro fruits and to use their mandibles on rival males as well;
– Harris’s hawks congregate in groups, showing their affinity for polyandry and communal hunting;
– robberflies mimic the appearance of the bees and wasps on which they prey;
– and peccaries reveal the adaptation of their reproductive cycle to the desert’s seasonal rains.
The book’s 38 chapters introduce readers to these and other desert animals and plants, tracing the course of the season through activities as vibrant as mating rituals and as subtle as the gradual deterioration of a fallen saguaro cactus. Enhanced by the line drawings of Marilyn Hoff Stewart, Sonoran Desert Summer is both an account of how modern biology operates and a celebration of the beauty and diversity that may be found in even the most unpromising places.