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For the first hundreds of millions of years,
the only living creatures on earth were, in fact, underwater.
Then, some 350 million years ago, for reasons unknown, a
primitive vertebrate crawled out of the water and stayed
out. Richard Ellis, one of America's foremost authorities
on ocean life, now takes on the deep mysteries of evolution
in the sea, tracing the path from the first microbes to
jawless, finless creatures that became the myriad species
alive today, including sharks, whales, seals, penguins,
dolphins -- and us.
Why (and how) did some creatures come to
glow in the darkness of the deepest ocean? How does life
now exist in the super-hot hydrothermic vents two miles
below the surface? How did a land mammal turn into a bottlenose
dolphin, or a flying bird into a deep-diving penguin? Which
sea creatures are the fast track to extinction?
Ellis's detailed drawings bring animals
to life that have not been seen for 400 million years, some
that rival science fiction monsters for sheer weirdness.
Early crocodiles and turtles were three times larger than
they are today, and there was once a manatee that was 30
feet long and had no bones below the elbow. There were trilobites,
jointed animals with complex eyes that dominated the seas
for 200 million years and then completely disappeared; sharks
with teeth on their backs; and others, 50 feet long, with
teeth the size of your hand.
Fifty million years ago, some land-dwelling
mammals reentered the water and began the process of modification
that turned them into whales: It was the most astonishing
transformation in mammalian history. In Aquagenesis,
you will track these changes and meet the paleontologists
who have found the links between the terrestrial mammals
and the first semiaquatic whales -- creatures that probably
looked like hyenas, huge shrews, or fat otters. Today the
only animals on earth that regularly walk in an upright,
two-legged stance are penguins and people. It is possible
that our size, shape, stride, intelligence, and hair (or
lack thereof) can also be explained by the provocative theory
of the aquatic ape.
Aquagenesis is not only about the
past -- it is about how the past shaped the world we live
in today. Join Richard Ellis on a fascinating tour of the
paleontological history of the ocean, past, present, and
future. You will be as astonished as he was at the wonder,
richness, and complexity of this story.
Richard Ellis is a celebrated authority
on marine biology and America's leading marine life artist.
He is the author of eleven books, including The Book
of Sharks, Men and Whales, Deep Atlantic,
Imagining Atlantis, and The Search for the Giant
Squid, and has written for Natural History, Audubon,
National Geographic, and many other magazines. His
paintings and murals are featured in major museums around
the country. Richard Ellis is also a research associate
at the American Museum of Natural History. He lives in New
York City.
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