"Here's a special book about a special place. Joanna Burger may well be an accomplished biologist and naturalist, but as you read these pages you'll discover that the little girl who was wowed by nature, the scientist-to-be, is very much on the same page." --Pete Dunne, director of Natural History Information, New Jersey Audubon Society

"Joanna Burger has artfully integrated her experiences as a naturalist of pineland ecosystems within the context of several sciences, most notably biology."--Bernadette Castro, commissioner, New York State Office of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation

"A welcome addition to the literature on those unique ecosystems along our Atlantic seaboard that we refer to as the pine barrens." --Howard P. Boyd, author of A Pine Barrens Odyssey: A Naturalist's Year in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey

In this book, naturalist Joanna Burger takes us on a series of delightful trips through the Pine Barrens. From the Albany Pine Bush, the Long Island Barrens, and the New Jersey Pine Barrens in the Northeast, to the pinelands of South Carolina and Florida, Burger describes in lively detail how these habitats have come to harbor such a unique assemblage of species.

She introduces us to amphibians and reptiles, neotropical migrants and other birds, and a range of common and unusual mammals. Burger also traces the regions' historic and geologic backgrounds, and the impact of human occupation from the time of the paleo-Indians to the present. She revisits the tension between development and preservation, reminding us that a healthy pine barren region requires uninterrupted land and rejuvenating fires, both of which are increasingly jeopardized.

Whispers in the Pines is essential reading for everyone concerned with the history and preservation of these unique landscapes and their wildlife.

Joanna Burger is Distinguished Professor of Biological Sciences at Rutgers University. Her seventeen books include A Naturalist along the Jersey Shore, 25 Nature Spectacles in New Jersey, and The Parrot Who Owns Me.

Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. The Creatures Within
2. A Ribbon of Pine Barrens
The Albany Pine Bush
3. The Albany Pine Bush
4. People in the Albany Pine Bush
5. The Butterfly Count and the Karner Blue
The Long Island Barrens
6 People of the Long Island Barrens
7. When Cranberries Ruled the Long Island Barrens
The New Jersey Pine Barrens
8. Truly an Ecological Reserve
9. The People of the New Jersey Pine Barrens
10. A Spring Chorus
11. Snake Communities in the Pines
12. Where the Barrens Meet the Sea
13. Landscapes for Neotropical Migrants
14. Strange Things Happen in the Dead of Night
15. Mammals of the Pines
16. There Are Snakes below the Ground
Pine Barrens to the South
17. The South Carolina Sandhills
18. The Florida Pines
19. Lake Wales: The True Barrens of Florida
The Future of the Pine Barrens
20. Looking Forward
Appendix. List of Species
Suggested Readings
Index