Come into a deep, old northern forest where trees reach for the sky, hundreds of feet high. Where their roots beneath the duff, spread out in vast tendrils seeking food, creating food for voles & mice, who, in turn, are fattened up for the owls hunting for food for their owlets.

Carol Reed-Jones has created a lyrical story of life around an old-growth fir tree, & Christopher Canyon's illustrations are bright, powerful & absorbing.

A keeper, its story is delightful & its images memorable.

"The Tree in the Ancient Forest" depicts the"circle of life" concept in a beautifully presented, easilyread format. The author, Carol Reed-Jones captures the essence of the importance and beauty of an ancient forest, presenting a different element on each page. Christopher Canyon's illustrations offer additional beauty to the ideas penned by the author. A wonderful book for children and adults alike -- a great gift book for the ecologically-minded, nature-lover! Highly recommended!

This book contains some beautiful artwork. Lots for the little ones to look at while you read.

Once again the circle of life is completed by the salmon of the pacific northwest. This is a cumulative story about the journey of the salmon from natal stream to ocean and back again. Parents nourish children who leave home to return to nourish their children.

Pictures a deeply colored and beautifully detailed. Would probably work best with slightly older children rather than younger. Would make an excellent classroom discussion book.

This story of the salmon life cycle is written in cumulative verse, like "The House That Jack Built." Starting from "This is the stream in the forest," the verses accumulate information as the eggs hatch into alevin and fry, while maintaining the lyrical flow of that stream. Then the smolt travel downstream to "an estuary wide" and the turbulent ocean. When the salmon receive the instinctual message to return home to spawn, the poetry of their journey is reversed: "... up the river with the tide, past the estuary wide ... obeying the voice of instinct's call, they leap a ten foot waterfall, to reach the place where they were born, bruised from the journey, weary and worn."

Again they arrive in the peaceful shady pool "filled with water, clear and cool, that flows in the stream in the forest." What a perfect way to demonstrate this cycle of life!

Illustrations saturate the pages with color. You'll feel wet from the flow of the cool stream, the splash of the waterfalls! Endpapers and an appendix add even more scientific information, as well as contacts and ideas for citizen conservation efforts.