Imagine an insect as small as a fat grain of rice killing a tree that towers 70 feet above the forest floor. Seems impossible, doesn’t it? Not for the mighty mountain pine beetle! In this book for kids ages 8 to 12, learn how this tiny insect has managed to change our western forests. Discover how the trees are fighting back, and find out what you can do during this mighty mountain pine beetle epidemic. Available at your local bookstore or from Mountain Press or Amazon. Published by Pruett Publishing Company.

Visit The Mountain Pine Beetle website. Puzzles, quizzes, video. Fun for all!

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Reviews:

THE MOUNTAIN PINE BEETLE: TINY BUT MIGHTY offers fun drawings by artist David Brooks to accompany over 40 photos as it considers the life and natural history of a tiny beetle that is killing entire forests in the Rocky Mountains. From the nature of the beetle to how trees are fighting back, this tells how the beetle survives winter, chooses trees to attack, and how it is an epidemic in the forest. Kids in grades 3-4 with good reading skills will find this an involving survey.

—Midwest Book Review

Part of Arcadia Publishing’s Images of America series, Around Nederland explores the history of Nederland, Colorado, and surrounding towns in photos. The Images of America series celebrates the history of neighborhoods, town, and cities across the country.

From the Longmont Times-Call:

Nederland: A history in pictures

By Quentin Young © 2011 Longmont Times-Call

Mining is central to the early history of Nederland. The town’s very name comes from Mining Company Nederland, a Dutch outfit that, despite its contribution to Nederland’s identity, was not quite successful in its local operations.

The area started as Native American hunting grounds. In 1864, hunter Nathan Brown built a house on Middle Boulder Creek, becoming the first white man to settle there. Soon others arrived in what then was called Brownsville. Five years after Brown’s arrival, prospector Sam Conger found silver nearby, thus beginning the area’s boom-bust cycles of metals mining.

This history is illustrated in more than 200 photographs featured in a book released this month, “Around Nederland,” by Kay Turnbaugh.

Turnbaugh published the Nederland weekly The Mountain-Ear for 27 years until she sold it 2004. She shares much of her extensive knowledge of the town’s history in the book’s chapter introductions and lengthy captions. “Around Nederland” is an illustrated history, but the text Turnbaugh includes gives readers a bedrock understanding of the events and circumstances reflected in the images.

The book is most interesting, in fact, when Turnbaugh supplies details about the people who populated early Nederland and the day-to-day facts of their lives. She includes a picture of resident George Breymaier, for example, and remarks that after his mother died when he was a child, he and his sister were placed in an orphanage “since it was unheard of for a father to raise children on his own.”

Goldie Griffith was one of a kind.

Sit back and read about Goldie Griffith, truly The Last of the Wild West Cowgirls.

Goldie did it all. The cowgirl and lady bronc rider rode with Buffalo Bill and was married during a Wild West show to a cowboy she later tried to kill. A newspaper reporter referred to the pretty young bronco buster as a “Heller in Skirts.” She was one of the first professional female athletes. She danced. She boxed. She wrestled. She worked as an actor and stunt rider in early westerns. She was present at many significant early day western events and knew many of the people who helped the American west become important to our history. After her bronco busting days, she became a rancher and restaurant owner.
This biography of Goldie Griffith is a 2010 WILLA Literary Award winner for creative non-fiction.

Visit Goldie’s website.

Download a chapter. Learn more. Find us on Facebook.

Now available on Kindle.