A Beast the Color of Winter

by Douglas H. Chadwick

I still remember this book vividly, even though it's been years and years since I read it. It's all about mountain goats, relating the experiences a wildlife biologist has on the high slopes of Montana while studying them. In the best style of nature writing, the narrative describes his experiences in finding the animals, learning to identify them, puzzling out their behavior, and speculating on many things. There are wonderful descriptions of both the landscape, the author's personal experiences and the animals' activities themselves. It's scientific and detailed but easily accessible to the curious reader and altogether intriguing. I never knew mountain goats could be so interesting. This is one of those books that I would immediately snatch up anywhere I found it, to add to my collection. Just thinking about it makes me want to go out and read more by the same author- I see he's also written about elephants, wolves and the elusive wolverine.

I love the title, too. Borrowed this one from the public library, once many years ago.

Rating: 5/5 ........ 224 pages, 1983