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B O O K R E V I E W por_176 229..231

Review of Recent mammals of Alaska, by S.O. MacDonald
and J.A. Cook (2010). Fairbanks: University of Alaska Press.
399 pp. ISBN 1602230722.

Billed as a summary monograph, this book is more pre-
cisely a catalogue of all mammals that have been
documented in Alaska during the past 10 000 years,
fronted by an introduction to mammalian collections in
Alaska, and a short overview of Alaskan biogeography,
and summarized in a set of appendices. In between these
two segments are 116 1–2-page species accounts, each of
which includes a brief summary of the taxonomy, distri-
bution, abundance and status. In creating this text, the
authors have summarized a great deal of detailed infor-
mation gleaned from a thorough combing of both peer-
reviewed and grey literature. However, the aim of the
book is centred less around describing the basic biology
and ecology of Alaskan mammals, than on introducing
the readers to the archived specimens that exist in
museum collections. This focus reflects the training and
expertise of the two authors, both of whom have spent
their careers affiliated with natural history collections:
S.O. MacDonald worked as a curator at the at the Uni-
versity of Alaska Museum (UAM) from 1979 to 1984, and
is now curator in the Mammals Division of the Museum
of Southwestern Biology (MSB) at the University of New
Mexico, whereas J.A. Cook was the Curator of Mammals
at UAM from 1990 to 2001, and now fills that role at
MSB. Cook, MacDonald and their students have con-
ducted extensive field collections in Alaska, and
throughout their careers have advocated strongly that
natural history collections are valuable research tools.
This book serves as a summary of their work, and as a
plea for continued efforts in these areas.

The focus on collections and their worth begins in the
introduction, with a review of the history of mammal
collections in the state, a review of the various uses to
which collections can be put and a few brief summaries of
studies that were either hindered by an incomplete
understanding of the diversity of species within an area or
enabled by the existence of robust collections. These
mini-reviews serve as examples of the value of natural
history collections, but because the emphasis is on the use
of collections, and not the results of the studies, they do
not provide the reader with much insight into the biology

or ecology of Alaskan mammals. The emphasis is also
apparent in the individual species accounts, where the
range maps for each species indicate Alaskan collection
locations much more clearly than species distribution.
Although collections are certainly valuable, and the
authors have gone to significant effort to provide infor-
mation on the museums housing all known Alaskan
specimens—and have thereby saved others this time and
effort—I can’t help but wonder if much of this task
couldn’t be accomplished through the judicious use of
online databases, which, by their nature, are better able
to incorporate new entries. Indeed UAM and MSB both
participate in an ongoing effort to make mammal
collection data from multiple museums available
and searchable online (http://arctos.database.museum/
home.cfm).

The section advocating collections is followed by a brief
overview of the six main regions within Alaska (South-
east, Southcentral, Central, Southwest, Western, and

Correspondence
Jennifer M. Burns, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Alaska

Anchorage, 3101 Science Circle, CPSB 101, Anchorage, AK 99508, USA.

E-mail: afjmb4@uaa.alaska.edu

Polar Research 29 2010 229–231 © 2010 the author, journal compilation © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd 229

http://arctos.database.museum/home.cfm
http://arctos.database.museum/home.cfm
mailto:afjmb4@uaa.alaska.edu


Northern Alaska). Each region’s vegetative community is
briefly summarized (approximately one page per region),
and a listing of key mammalian taxa present in the region
is included. This section is a fairly dry recounting of facts,
and is one of the few sections of the text that is not
adequately referenced, despite being derivative of any
number of books on Alaskan ecology. The few low-
resolution black and white photographs included in this
section add little value. In addition, as these regions
reflect the Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s game
management units (http://wildlife.alaska.gov/gis), rather
than established ecoregions (Nowacki et al. 2001), the
regional species distributions presented do not provide
insight into biotic factors that influence habitat selection.
This is also reflected in the often terse description of the
habitats of individual species (for example, beaver [Castor
canadensis] habitat is described as “lakes, ponds, marshes,
rivers and streams” [p. 79]). Data on Alaska’s current (or
historic) climate are not included, nor is any indication of
thermal tolerances provided within the individual species
accounts. Thus, the interplay between climate, habitats
and species distribution remains unexplored. This is
notable mainly because the authors earlier argued (pp. 3,
20) that expanded collections are needed to better under-
stand the impact of global climate change on species
distributions, and yet this book does little to provide even
the minimal level of detail with which to begin to make
such links.

Throughout the text, the authors focus on what is
present rather than why it is present. Indeed, the exist-
ence of a single documented occurrence or specimen
record from Alaska appears to be the sole requirement
for inclusion in this text. This odd selection criterion
produces a text that treats rare vagrants (harp seal
[Pagophilus groenlandicus]), migrants (grey whale
[Eschrichtius robustus]), endemics (many of the bats),
introduced species (wapati [Cervus canadensis]) and
common residents (black bear [Ursus americanus])
equally, but that only includes extinct Holocene
mammals for which specimens exist within Alaskan insti-
tutions (Steller’s sea cow [Hydrodamalis gigas], woolly
mammoth [Mammuthus primigenius]). The 116 species
included in this comprehensive catalogue are grouped
taxonomically, with alphabetical organization only
present at the level of genus and species, and not among
families or orders. As a result, it is difficult to page
through the text to locate particular species, even with
knowledge of ordinal and familiar affiliation.

The individual species entries that make up the vast
majority of this book each include sections on systematics
(nomenclature for species and subspecies; source for the
original description, type locality and museum housing
the type specimen), distribution (globally and regionally),

habitat (vegetative community in which species is
located), status (abundance) and fossils (geological depos-
its in which fossils have been located). These sections
have a clear Alaskan focus, although data from other
regions are occasionally included. Although scrupulously
accurate, the information under each subheading has
been kept so minimal that it almost fails to convey any
worthwhile data (e.g., the status of meadow jumping
mice [Zapus hudsonius] is “localized and sometimes
abundant” [p. 82].) Whereas this brevity is frequently
mitigated by the copious use of relevant citations, any
reader intending to use this text to learn much about the
mammals of Alaska will be immediately frustrated by the
need to return to the library to find the source literature.
Conversely, information provided under the systematics
and fossils categories often assumes extensive geographic
and geological background, rendering these sections chal-
lenging for the lay reader. Nor will the text be of much
use to readers aiming to determine species range or dis-
tribution, as the range maps included with each account
emphasize collection locations. Statewide distributional
data, if mapped at all, is often of poor quality. Aside from
a few pleasant line drawings by Alaskan artist W.D. Berry,
most of the species remain un-illustrated.

The text ends with an extensive and up-to-date litera-
ture section, in which often difficult to find agency and
non-profit organization reports stand side by side with
peer-reviewed literature. The authors are to be com-
mended on the depth and breadth of their review. The
index is similarly thorough, and makes the entire text
much more accessible to the scientist and public readers.
However, it is the appendices that are the true glory of
this text. In a series of 12 detailed tables, the authors
concisely summarize and cross-collate all the data con-
tained within the preceding species accounts. Among
others, there are appendices tabulating the regional dis-
tribution and habitat preferences of the various taxa, the
museums in which specimens are housed, the temporal
occurrence of the species, and the history and fate of the
introductions of non-native species. These tables do
almost as thorough a job at conveying the information as
the main text, and are likely to be much more useful to
the readers of this book, as they remove the need to page
through multiple accounts to discover the key facts.
Where necessary, the appendices are equally well refer-
enced as the rest of the book.

The fact that I found the most compelling information
of the book contained in the appendices highlights my
puzzlement over the audience at which this text is aimed.
Hobbyists and lay people who may find this book in
museum bookstores are unlikely to be greatly interested
in the locations of scientific collections or the details of
taxonomic nomenclature, and would probably prefer

Book review

Polar Research 29 2010 229–231 © 2010 the author, journal compilation © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd230

http://wildlife.alaska.gov/gis


more information on each species to be included here,
rather than only referenced. For these readers, this dry
text fails to be a useful field guide to the mammals
of Alaska because of its dearth of basic biological or
ecological information and the remarkable absence of
photographs in the species accounts. However, aside from
the appendices, the text also fails as a reference guide for
scientists working on Alaska’s mammalian fauna, as the
derivative nature of the information provided within each
species’ summary is unlikely to provide any new informa-
tion to active scientists. As one example, all pinniped and
cetacean distributional data reported here are obtained
from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administra-
tion’s stock assessment report (Angliss & Outlaw 2007),
which summarizes multiple primary studies, is available
online and is updated regularly. Active researchers are far
more likely to refer to the most recent stock assessment
report, Rice (1998), and UAM’s online database, rather
than this book. Unfortunately, despite its breadth, the

shallow depth of the information contained within these
pages almost guarantees that this reference will be of use
only to a small subset of biogeographers and taxonomers
that are not currently familiar with Alaska or its
mammals; neither working scientists nor the general
public are likely to find this text compelling.

References

Angliss R.P. & Outlaw R.B. 2007. Alaska marine mammal stock
assessments, 2006. NOAA Technical Memorandum
NMFSAFSC-168. Seattle, WA: US Department of
Commerce.

Nowacki G., Spenser P., Fleming M., Brock T. & Jorgenson T.
2001. Unified ecoregions of Alaska. U.S. Geological Survey
Open-File Report 02-297 (map). Reston, VA: US Geological
Survey.

Rice D.W. 1998. Marine mammals of the world: systematics and
distribution. Lawrence, KS: Society for Marine Mammalogy.

Book review

Polar Research 29 2010 229–231 © 2010 the author, journal compilation © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd 231