Last Chance to See

In 1985, (incidentally the year I was born), author Douglas Adams was sent to Madagascar by The World Wildlife Fund and the Observer newspaper looking for the ‘Aye-aye’, a species of lemur thought to be on the edge of extinction. With zoologist Mark Carwardine Adams travelling the world between 1988 and 1989 searching for various endangered species, including gorillas, white rhinos, the Komodo dragon, the Yangtze River Dolphin and several others. Many of these excursions became the basis for a book and a BBC Radio 4 series, named Last Chance to See.

20 years after the original journey, Mark and Douglas Adams’ close friend Stephen Fry are retracing route and trying to learn what became of the animals featured in the series. One of the most amazing animals they rediscover is ‘The Amazonian Manatee’, an incredibly beautiful shy creature that lives only in the Amazon Basin. Slow moving to the point of dormant, the Amazonian Manatee is closely related to the elephant, it looks like a cross between a seal and hippo, but Douglas Adams described it more aptly as ‘not so much like a seal as like a travelling case for carrying a seal in’.

The book is one of my favourites, charming and endearing as all of Adam’s work is, it really captures his enthusiasm and joy at seeing these rare creatures face-to-face, as well as drawing home the importance of these species in the richness of the natural world.

As Mark Carwardine in the last paragraph of the book;

There is one last reason for caring, and I believe that no other is necessary. It is certainly the reason why so many people have devoted their lives to protecting the likes of rhinos, parakeets, kakapos and dolphins. And it is simply this: the world would be a poorer, darker, lonelier pace without them.