A review by lorrainelowereads
Adventures of a Young Naturalist: The Zoo Quest Expeditions by David Attenborough

4.0

Adventures of a Young Naturalist by David Attenborough was first published in the 80s but has a new intro for this 2017 edition. There are three parts to the memoir where Attenborough recounts his travels in the 1950s to Guyana, Indonesia and Paraguay for a BBC program called Zoo Quest. The program aimed to film exotic animals in their native environment before cutting to a studio where the (live) animal would magically be and a more detailed examination would be done. The quests were part funded by the London Zoo as they would then get the animal to keep. The book is as fascinating in it’s details of various forms of wildlife as any of DA’s TV programs and it is written with the same charm and wit which comes across so well on the screen. And the stories of his escapades in these foreign countries in search of animals was really interesting and very readable, and actually quite funny sometimes. But the most fascinating thing of all about the book was the quantity and type of animals they just took from their home with zero qualms whatsoever. There is no doubt they looked after them really well and knew their stuff in terms of what to feed each particular species etc, but I mean they took them with a greediness and a casualness that was so shocking. Monkeys, birds, large and small reptiles, foxes, armadillos, insects, snakes, a wolf, an orangutan and a bear to name but a few. And they took babies from mothers, no joke. All the way through after a new animal had been captured we were told how ‘perfectly happy/comfortable/content’ they were in their new prison. But I’m sure the animals would have preferred to be back in the wild with their families!! Anyway I had to keep reminding myself it was the 50s, and all the animals were looked after and went on to thrive in the zoo. Really good book if you’re into travel, animals, nature etc.