Dynamic Aquaria, Third Edition: Building Living Ecosystems (ISBN 0123706416)

A landmark must-read for anyone interested in understanding the dynamics of aquatic or marine ecosystems!:
Dr. Walter Adey is one of those rare, truly multi-disciplinary scientists. I once heard a list of all his advanced degrees, which ranged from marine biology to botany to geology, but I can't remember them. I came away with the impression that he was in a position to really understand the complexity of a living ecosystem. That breadth and depth of knowledge shines through in Dynamic Aquaria, making this a far more interesting and readable book than the title might indicate. What's more, this book is about the process of recreating living ecosystems, which is the true test of understanding. As such, this book could be considered one of the seminal works of what is now a multifaceted global discipline: restoration ecology. My exposure to Dr. Adey (and to the late reef restoration researcher Wolf Hilbertz) in the mid-90's, when he was Director of the Marine Systems Laboratory at the Smithsonian Institution. This book, and those two men, set me on the restoration path. It led to my writing The Restoration Economy (2002), which was the first book to document the multi-trillion-dollar collection of industries and scientific disciplines that are restoring our natural and built environments. My entire professional life has since been focused on community revitalization and natural resource restoration, culminating in a new book, reWealth (McGraw-Hill, 2008). What I'm saying is that the insights I gained from Dynamic Aquaria helped change my life in a very positive and major way. I don't know what higher praise I could give a book. If you love this blue planet, maybe it can do the same for you.