Blog Posts by Subject: Animals

Alice-Miranda on Vacation by Jacqueline Harvey, 2010

Seven-and-a-half year old Alice-Miranda is home from boarding school, and she is making a splash. She brings her friend Jacinta with her to a wonderful mansion that is their playground during the school break. She has no qualms about letting anyone know what she thinks, but in a matter-of-fact, somewhat super-humanly polite way. She seems oblivious to intended or unintended slights from others, and she is completely adorable. Alice-Miranda has an uncanny ability to never take anything personally.

A Taste of Perfection by Laura Langston, 2002

Erin was ecstatic about her chance to volunteer at the SPCA over the summer, only to learn that her father had been laid off and she was to spend the summer at her grandmother's kennel, with black and yellow Labrador Retrievers. On the positive side, at least she gets to see her friend Cassie, who is about everything horses, and her sister Treena, who help her embark on a major makeover for seventh grade. Like any teenager, Erin is very self-conscious, in particular about the warts on her hand, the hair on her legs, and her height. Luckily, Erin's grandmother is very understanding and convinces her mother to let her shave so 

Background Info on the Museum & Library: Luckily for me, I was able to visit the library of the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) with a staff group. I did not realize that their library is open to the public, and I was not aware of the amount of empirical research that goes on in the museum. The museum is focused on the natural sciences, the earth and animals. There are about 200 scientists that work for the museum, and the library is a METRO member. The library is a special library and academic library. There is a graduate school attached to the museum in which students study comparative biology. The museum publishes three journals.

After a short hiatus, I hope to bring another joyous book recommendation! 

The Pic Pick of the day is Hugs from Pearl By Paul Schmid.

Dog stories was the January theme for Mixed Bag: Story Time for Grown-Ups, the read-aloud program I do on Wednesdays at lunch-time every other week. (I promised to read cat stories later this year in rebuttal.) Most of the stories I chose to read in January were selected from the book The Best Dog Stories. Since I included a list of 25 favorite films about dogs in my last blog post, this post features a list of favorite books about dogs.

On Saturday, December 3, 2011, Phyllis Newman, the Tony-award winning actress and illustrator of What's New at the Zoo? by Betty Comden, came to the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building's South Court Auditorium to read from the book. Kids from PS 212 sang the book, which is actually the lyrics to the song in a Broadway Show, Do Re Mi.

Hey animal lovers! Yeah, I'm looking at you.

Welcome to Truth is Stranger than Fiction — an occassional BiblioCommons list devoted to special topics in non-fiction. The focus of this month's list is on quirky animal stories! From elephants to oysters, pandas to puppies, there is sure to be a story to make even the greatest of grinches smile. 

NYPL has many great resources for budding zoologists, environmentalists, veterinarians, and students who are just plain curious! This list has been compiled to help students understand how animals act in their natural environments. These beautiful, information-rich recommendations are sure to enthrall your students — get ready to explore some of the wonders of the animal kingdom! Feedback is greatly appreciated. Feel free to leave comments and suggestions below!

Silence in this court, here comes the judge, this court is in session.

Jen and I will attempt to judge the book Whales on Stilts by M.T. Anderson by its cover and its cover alone.

Once a month, the Mulberry Street Library hosts R.E.A.D. with Mudge, a special program in which children read aloud to a registered therapy dog and licensed handler. Named in honor of the national Reading Education Assistance Dogs program and Cynthia Rylant's beloved boy and dog books, Henry and Mudge, Mulberry's Street's team is made up of the wonderful Kimberly Wang and her amazing dog Theo. We recently caught up with Theo's owner Kimberly...

Once a month, Beth Neuman and her dog Forest, an 11 year old toy poodle, volunteer at Ottendorfer Library’s Paws ‘n’ Books program. The literacy program offers children ages six and older the opportunity to read aloud to a four legged friend for 15 minutes, helping to boost their reading confidence. We interviewed Beth before one of their Paws 'n' Books sessions.

The first Earth Day was proclaimed on April 22, 1970 by one of its principal founders, Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin. Already frustrated by the attitudes of big business, Senator Nelson, as the chairman of the White House Conference on Small Business, wisely noted that "the economy is a wholly owned subsidiary of the environment, not the other way around." He became greatly influenced by John McConnell, a grassroots organizer from San Francisco and Harvard graduate student, Denis Hayes. He asked the latter to organize nationwide events on college and public school campuses that would bring awareness to the environmental crises facing the world. As a 

Do you plan to come to the next Handmade Crafternoon on March 5th to make your own tiny avian sculpture with artist Abby Glassenberg, author of The Artful Bird? Want to brush up on bird characteristics in advance?  Then the Library's Digital Gallery is a great place to spend some time.  Here are a few of my favorite bird books and bird images. (Click on the heading or title link for each category to see all bird images from it.)

Some fine feathered friends named Putter, Topper, Hedwig and Evie dropped by the Tottenville Library this week and they didn't look like our typical library visitor. Their beautiful feathers and razor sharp talons wowed Staten Islanders of all ages as Environmental Educator Bill Flynn and his assistant Henry brought a little bit of their Connecticut nature center to NYC. 
 

The Brown Pelican (Pelcanus Occidentalis) is described on many web sites as one of seven or eight species of pelicans with a wing span over 7 feet...

On September 5, 1928 ten-year-old Nathaniel Fludd’s parents are declared lost at sea. Alone in the world with no other close relatives and a governess eager to abscond with her Tidy Sum from the Fludd estate, Nathaniel is sent to live with Phil A. Fludd–a mysterious cousin Nate has never met, let alone heard of in Nathaniel Fludd, Beastologist: Flight of the Phoenix by R. L. LaFevers with illustrations by Kelly Murphy.

Although I don’t keep bees, I’ve lately found myself being drawn into their curious world—looking into New York City’s beekeepers; investigating honeybees in history, literature, design, and in the kitchen; even incorporating the beehive into my own handmade efforts. And I recently discovered bees in biography too, in the story of Lorenzo Lorraine Langstroth, a nineteenth century giant in the world of honeybees, who worked to devise a workable modern frame hive.  

My friend and I have a longstanding debate over whether kangaroos run or hop. Regardless of who is correct (I am), it’s true that many urban dwellers develop a curious understanding of the natural world. Here’s a small sampling of how some people, city folk and others, relate to animals or view the animal kingdom.

With new technologies that can make images of molecules, biology has been returning to its origins as a visual science, according to Moselio Schaechter, writing on his blog Small Things Considered. Biologists can now “see” how an enzyme works or how macromolecules interact with molecules large and small, and the revolution is leading to a specialist field called Structural Biology. The visual origins of biology are abundantly illustrated in the holdings of The New York Public Library, including original and facsimile editions of Robert Hooke’s beautifully illustrated Micrographia. This flea is reminiscent of Hooke's famous illustration, but actually