Mammals of Sri Lanka (book)

Mammals of Sri Lanka by Asoka Yapa and Gamini Ratnavira is a zoology book about all the mammalian species in Sri Lanka. This is the first complete zoological book ever published in Sri Lanka after about 80 years, about mammals. The first landmark of Sri Lankan mammals were dated back to 1935, where W.W.A Phillips wrote Manuals of The Mammals of Ceylon. After that, there were many journals and other small works done about mammals, but no one never thought of a precise fully detaild and fully photographd volume.^[1]

Asoka Yapa, is a resident in Canada, that trained as zoologist, was a science editor with Canadian Forest Service, and also a key member of many departments in Canada related to wildlife. As he said in the introduction of the book, he was influenced by work of his friend Prof. Sarath Kotagama, who is the leading ornithologist in Sri Lanka. Kotagama invited him to make a full detailed book about Sri Lankan mammalian fauna and he accepted it. He went Sri Lanka for few visits to Sri Lankan National Parks for further investigations and took many resources from both Sri Lankan and overseas zoologists and wildlife experts to write the book.

The book describes all the mammalian species in Sri Lanka known up to date, with 125+ species, both terrestrial and marine. The colored portraits were drawn by Gamini Ratnavira, who is popular wildlife artist in Sri Lanka. The other natural colored photographs were taken by numerous animals lovers, and there are unique collection of photographs, where some photos of very rare species are into the arena for the first time with this book.

One of the book's expert, Rohan Pethiyagoda, who is a Sri Lankan expert on fish fauna, described the book in his forward as;

"The Mammals of Sri Lanka is not merely of reference its hundreds of pages would seem to make it. It can be read with pleasure from cover to cover, and despite its heft, will prove invaluable also in the field. It is certain to be cherished for many years to come and is destined to become a cornerstone of the literature on Sri Lanka's vertebrate fauna. I (Pethiyagoda) hope it reaches the widest possible readership and goes on to be translated also into island's local languages so as to inspire the next phase of public interest in our country's incredible biodiversity."

References

• http://www.lakdasun.org/forum/index.php?topic=9319.0
• http://www.srilankaecotourism.com/mamals.htm
• http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=93717
• http://www.hi.lk/asoka.html
• https://window2nature.wordpress.com/category/book-reviews/
• http://www.gaminiratnavira.com