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An exploration geologist by profession and keen birder by hobby, Nick Norman was surprised to see a woodpecker in Brazil, where he was working at the time, which was strikingly similar to those he knew in the land of his birth, South Africa. His assumption that it was explained by an ancestral woodpecker family having been fragmented when supercontinent Gondwana split into Africa and South America – and others – was contested by the leading ornithologist he consulted when next back in South Africa. In subsequent work engagements in South America, he saw other birds there, as well as trees, which represented families he knew well in Africa. That was the mystery: how the same families of flora and fauna had distributed themselves in continents astride a major world ocean, the South Atlantic.
This book is his attempt to explain the mystery, delving into a range of topic like continental drift, plate tectonics, and ocean currents. Sherlock Holmes said: 'When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.' In solving the mystery, the truth of Holmes's axiom became more and more evident to Nick as he discovered extraordinary travelogues of trees and birds for which, given enough time, a wide ocean was no barrier. It is a story of astonishing epiphanies.
Foreword 7
Prologue 9
Chapter 1. Journeys 13
Chapter 2. African doppelgängers – birds and trees – across South America 19
Chapter 3. Stories too good not to share 27
Chapter 4. Continental drift: the proposal 35
Chapter 5. Continental drift: proof – the weight of evidence 51
Chapter 6. Continental drift: the verdict and its acceptance 67
Chapter 7. Continental drift: its modus operandi and some manifestations 85
Chapter 8. A mverick tectonic plate: the Falkland Islands 107
Chapter 9. Charles Darwin: the origin – and spread – of species
Chapter 10. Genetics, DNA and phylogenetics 145
Chapter 11. Transatlantic travels of trees 1: the conifers 161
Chapter 12. Transatlantic travels of trees 2: the flowering trees 173
Chapter 13. The birds: where there's a wing there's a way 185
Chapter 14. A clue out of left field: the last doubt put to flight 197
Epilogue 207
Acknowledgements 208
Selected bibliography 216
References 218
Picture credits 221
Index 224
Nick Norman is a published author of best-selling geology books for interested lay people. His Geological Journeys: A Guide to South Africa's Rocks and Landforms (co-authored with Gavin Whitfield) was shortlisted for the Nielsen Bookseller's Choice Award in 2007, and his Box of Rocks was included in Exclusive Books 2015 'Homebru' list of favourite titles. Living in Franschhoek, he is active in promoting geoheritage in South Africa.
"[...] The result is a book that is imminently readable and exceptionally educational, a history of several branches of science and famous scientists, and a very good layman’s guide to biogeography. In its pages you will meet and learn about the geologists and biologists who were pioneers in geology, the concept of ‘continental drift’ and the theory and evidence of evolution. [...] The key to the hardly believable trans-Atlantic journeys of Nick’s woodpeckers and the other birds of modest flying abilities is ascribed to the marine ‘floating islands’ of plant debris that are forcefully ejected from the mouth of the copious, fast-flowing Congo River with such impetus that they travel about 800 km into the Atlantic, from where wind and currents seem to do the rest. We are reminded too that over a million years, a one-in-a-million chance is not impossible, and therefore it is more than likely probable! One has to think in geological time scales about these things… This book is an excellent, educational read, very well executed and illustrated [...]"
– African Wildlife & Environment 85, 2024
