In a distinguished photographer and a passionate naturalist document sites in the American Southwest and Mexico that are gauges to the environment. The wetlands included are Cuatro Cienegas Basin in Coahuila, Mexico, the San Pedro River in Arizona, the Escalante River in Utah, the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge in New Mexico, the playas and wetlands in Arizona, the Mohave Desert in California, and the Big Bend National Park in Texas. "Exploration of desert wetlands—whether on foot, with photographs, or in words—involves vacillating between tremendous, uplifting beauty and great, heartbreaking degradation. We offer the images and words in your hands that you might grasp the beauty more readily, and join the chorus of voices calling for an end to despoiling of these treasurelands."—Thomas Lowe Fleischner in "Mr. Niemeyer's photography . . . is utterly superb."—