Saving America's Amazon by Ben Raines

Ben Raines (Author), E. O. Wilson (Foreword by) Though almost no one knows it, the most diverse forests and aquatic systems in the nation lie in Alabama. Described as America’s Amazon, Alabama has more species per square mile than any other state. Its rivers are home to more species of fish, crayfish, salamanders, mussels, snails and turtles than any other aquatic system in North America. And the contest isn’t even close. California, for instance, has nine species of crayfish, while Alabama has 84. The 11 states that are drained by the Colorado River system are collectively home to 26 species of fish, while Alabama is home to 350 species of fish. But the wild places of the state are also under siege. Alabama has suffered more aquatic extinctions than any other state. In fact, more than half of all extinctions in the United States since the 1800s happened in Alabama, which has been logged, mined, and poisoned by a succession of industries. In this compelling portrait of the rough histor