As the world's leading authority on wasps, Howard Ensign Evans' lifelong study of this creature was only one aspect of his life as an acclaimed scientist and author. For readers, he illuminated the otherworldly lives of humble creatures in such popular books as "Life on a Little-Known Planet", "Wasp Farm", and "Pioneer Naturalists". Evans was a master entomologist who seems only to have been truly comfortable in places where the bugs called; there he found his beauty, his magic and his poetry. In this collection, which he completed just before his death at 83, it appears Evans knew all 900,000 species of his gems that to others were only insects, along with the lowly magpie and the birds of Australia as well. Edward O. Wilson, one of the world's preeminent biologists, is the author of more than twenty-five books, including Sociobiology, the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Ants, and the best-selling novel Anthill. A professor emeritus at Harvard University, he lives in Lexington, Massachusetts.