Saving Animals from Oil Spills by Stephen Person

Saving Animals from Oil Spills

Part of the Rescuing Animals from Disasters series

Written by Stephen Person.

Bearport Publishing. Fall 2011

ISBN: 9781617722882

Children enjoy reading about animals, and this new series from Bearport Publishing is sure to find an audience.  When Disaster Strikes: Rescuing Animals gives a firsthand account of the courageous rescue attempts made by animal lovers to save animals from actual natural disasters that children have heard about in the news. In 32 pages topics in the series include titles about the 2008 flood in Iowa, 2010 earthquake in Haiti, Hurricane Katrina in 2005, 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, the 2003 wildfires in Southern California, and the 2010 volcanic eruption of Mount Merapi on the island of Java in Indonesia.

This reviewer was given a copy of Saving Animals from Oil Spills written by Stephen Persons.

This book was organized with twelve entries that work like a timeline showing the progression of events and how the quick response by so many saved a majority of the area wildlife. The twelve entries are two pages in length and are supported by a brief text that uses direct language; as if readers are there watching events unfold. Also a lot of color photos support the text.

‘Racing to the Coast’ explains that Kayla, a biologist from Louisiana left her regular job and rushed to the Gulf of Mexico in order to join a wildlife rescue team. Readers see the a rescue worker capturing them in nets, carting them to rescue centers in pet carriers to cleaning them up and returning them to the wild. The captions accurately reflect the action in the photos.

The author does a good job of keeping the topic positive. In The Great Egg Rescue, we learn that baby sea turtles would have died upon entering the oily waters. Rescue workers dug up 28,000 eggs and took them to the Atlantic coast of Florida.

“Of the 28,000 baby sea turtle eggs that were dug up and moved, 15,000 hatchlings made it to the ocean. That is a very high success rate. In nature, animals such as raccoons and birds eat more than half of all turtle eggs and hatchlings before they reach the water.”

Three cheers for that information!

Throughout, words that children may not know the meaning of are set off in bold and explained in the glossary.

Though the book has a positive spin, it does explain the dangers and lasting effects oils spills do have on the environment and the food chain.

Included in this book: Famous oil spills and rescues, Animals at risk from spills, glossary, bibliography (web sites), read more on oil spills, index.

There is a web link that directs readers back to Bearport for more information about rescuing animals from oil spills.

Other titles in the series: Saving Animals after Earthquakes, Saving Animals from Fires, Saving Animals after Floods, Saving Animals from Hurricanes, Saving Animals from Volcanoes.