num_pages: 400
description: What is the best way to survive when the going gets tough? Hiding underground. From penguins to dinosaurs trilobites and humans Anthony Martin reveals the subterranean secret of survival. Humans have gone underground for survival for thousands of years from underground cities in Turkey to Cold Warera bunkers. But our burrowing roots go back to the very beginnings of animal life on earth. Without burrowing the planet would be very different today. Many animal lineages alive nowincluding our ownonly survived a cataclysmic meteorite strike 65 million years ago because they went underground. On a grander scale the chemistry of the planet itself had already been transformed many millions of years earlier by the first animal burrows which altered whole ecosystems. Every day we walk on an earth filled with an under-ground wilderness teeming with life. Most of this life stays hidden yet these animals and their subterranean homes are ubiquitous ranging from the deep sea to mountains from the equator to the poles. Burrows are a refuge from predators a safe home for raising young or a tool to ambush prey. Burrows also protect animals against all types of natural fires droughts storms meteorites global warmingsand coolings. In a book filled with spectacularly diverse fauna acclaimed paleontologist and ichnologist Anthony Martin reveals this fascinating hidden world that will continue to influence and transform life on this planet. 16 pages of illustrations
language: English
title: The Evolution Underground: Burrows, Bunkers, and the Marvelous Subterranean World Beneath our Feet
publisher: Pegasus Books