Mike Tomkies gives a remarkable picture of the whole cycle of nature around him, in a harsh and testing environment of unrivalled beauty. Vivid colours and sounds fill these pages - exotic wild orchids, the roar of rutting stags, a pair of dragonflies mating, the flight of the redwing, the territorial movements of foxes, otters and badgers, an oak tree being torn apart by hurricane-force gales. Nothing seems to escape his penetrating eye, to which the selection of his photographs in this book - some revealing little-known aspects of animal behaviour - immediately testifies. Yet Mike's extraordinary insights into the wildlife that shared his otherwise empty territory of 300 square miles are not gained without perseverance in the face of perilous hazards. Every pound of supplies (including heavy gas canisters) has to be manhandled in and out of his boat, which once sank beneath him in a storm. Thousands of miles of rock faces and hillside must be trekked each year in summer and winter, the tussock grass concealing sodden peat holes that will break an ankle. Hours on end, day and night, are spent in cramped hides on windy, precipitous ledges.A Last Wild Place is much more than the chronicle of a man who left city life in order to study the wilderness.  It is a celebration of nature at its most rugged and spectacular in all Britain. Like the enormous ageing salmon he threw back because he felt he had no right to claim its life, Mike Tomkies reveals through his quest our urgent need to become retuned to natural rhythms if mankind is to regain a measure of health and sanity in a world bent on self-destruction.

A last wild place

Science & Math

Tomkies, Mike

Biological Sciences

Jonathan Cape Ltd.

Moobli

RANDOM HOUSE UK

<p>This is an account of observations of exotic wildlife made in the vast, sparcely-populated Iberian hinterland where tourists seldom venture.</p>

In Spains Secret Wilderness

Travel

Europe

JONATHAN CAPE.

In broiling sun or icy winter gales, often drenched to the skin by squalls, Mike Tomkies has for many years negotiated the slippery, almost sheer rockfaces in pursuit of an understanding of his favourite bird, the golden eagle. From damp, cramped hides on precarious cliff faces in remote Highland mountains, he has kept watch for up to 38 hours at a time to record the remarkable rapport between the parent birds, with their seven-feet wingspan and the incomparable joy of watching them teach a youngster to catch prey. Although covering the nesting success of ten eyries, On Wing and Wild Water concentrates mainly on two magnificent pairs of eagles, one of which almost brings about Tomkies' death as he struggles under the weight of film equipment to the farthest neck at the end of what he calls the 'killer trek'. The eagle treks are accompanied by an extraordinary vigil when a pair of even rarer black-throated divers nest on an islet on the loch and some peregrine falcons colonise a nearby sea cliff. The book is laced with all the ambiguities of a taxing wilderness life without gas, electricity, telephone, TV or postal service and ends with a memorable trek to a pair of golden eagles nesting in the Lake District after a century of extinction south of the border.

On wing and wild water

J. Cape

Mike Tomkie tells the story of his life in a remote Highland lochside cottage where he lived alone for 20 years without electricity, gas, telephone or postal service, studying the wildlife.

A Last Wild Place

TRAFALGAR SQUARE +

This is a true story of Mike Tomkies and his alsation dog Moobli living in the Highlands of Scotland, researching the wildlife there and withstanding the rigours of rural life together. Moobli was the author's only constant companion for eight years in the Scottish Highlands and Mike tells of his tracking skill in scenting out deer, badgers, otters and even wildcats without harming them, but making it possible for him to achieve a record of the whole cycle of nature in the western Highlands. Moobli also lived in amicable friendship with Mike's foxes and owls, as well as injured creatures which came to them for succour. He would also fetch heavy tools such as a sledge hammer or an axe as Mike worked in the woods. Mike grew to believe the animal possessed an uncanny ability to read his mind when no word was spoken or no betraying movement made, but the understanding turned into tragedy as Moobli slowly lost the use of his rear legs through creeping arthritic paralysis. Mike Tomkies has written "Out of the Wind", "On the Wing and Wild Water" and "Wildcat Haven".

Crafts, Hobbies & Home

Pets & Animal Care

Pan/Macmillan

My wilderness wildcats

History

Macdonald and Jane's

DOUBLEDAY

Between Earth and Paradise

Classic wildlife writing on remote Scottish island

Between earth and paradise

Biographies & Memoirs

Travelers & Explorers

Heinemann

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Books by Tomkies, Mike