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Centre professor writes new version of classic textbook
RELEASED: March 9, 2006
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DANVILLE, KY—After years working in a supporting role in creating Bond's Biology of Fishes, Centre College biology professor Mike Barton has assumed authorship of the third edition of the classic textbook, recently published by Thomson/Brooks Cole.
As a graduate student at Oregon State University, Barton helped edit the manuscript of the first edition, which was written by his mentor Carl Bond in 1979. For the second edition, published in 1996, Barton contributed two chapters. For the third edition, Barton says he has been "entrusted with the reputation of this classic work" and is the sole author.
Barton sees this latest edition "first and foremost [as] a tribute to its original author and my former mentor Carl Bond," who is now retired. Barton notes in his preface that the scope of fish biology has expanded over the years. While the second edition devoted a single chapter to behavior and ecology, the current edition features a full six chapters on ecology and two on behavior. "This extended coverage," Barton writes, "acknowledges the increasingly important contribution that fish studies have made to the maturation of these disciplines."
Continues Barton "We 'fishy types' have witnessed the transformation of our field from one in which the fishes were mainly studied for their own sake to one in which fishes have become important organisms for the elucidation of the entire spectrum of biological study, from molecules to ecosystems." In short, Barton states, "Fishes can provide crucial insights into the way the world works."
The book features a eye-catching cover by noted Alaska-based fish painter Ray Troll, whose "fishy images" can be found in museums, books, magazines and t-shirts in virtually every corner of the globe. Its primary intended audience is a junior- or senior-level college fish biology course, says Barton, but is "also intended as a reference guide for anyone who professes an enthusiasm for fishes."
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