Moth: An Evolution Story

This nonfiction picture book tells the story of the peppered moth, which over time has changed numbers in how many have light-colored wings versus dark-colored wings, in order to ensure survival by blending in with their surroundings.

This is a pretty straightforward text that looks at climate and natural selection through the lens of a singular species. Backmatter gives a little further detail, but this is generally for a younger audience in that it keeps to the basics -- and focuses on the optimistic view that animals can adjust despite the damage done by humans.

Illustrations are nicely done overall except that the color-saturated pages sometimes made it difficult to read the text when it was against a rather dark background.

Powerful and visually spectacular, Moth is the remarkable evolution story that captures the struggle of animal survival against the background of an evolving human world in a unique and atmospheric introduction to Darwin's theory of Natural Selection.

-Stunning illustrations to reflect the interesting and informative prose. Accurate yet still easy to understand. Explains adapting to changes and evolution quite well.

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"This is a story of light and dark.
Of change and adaptation,
of survival and hope.
It starts with a little moth."

At first, the "speckled and freckled" peppered moths had the best camouflage, but once the industrial revolution started spewing pollution into the air, the darker-colored moths were better camouflaged. But as the years passed, "people decided to clean up the air," and today, both dark- and speckled moths are common.

Back matter includes "the story of the peppered moth" (evolution, natural selection, adaptation).

Informative and beautiful. Art created with watercolor, crayons, acrylic, collage, and Photoshop.

The Peppered Moth is an example of evolutionary biology. The frequency of dark-colored moths increased as a result of the air pollution from coal plants during the Industrial Revolution.

Read the recently published a science picture book, then learn more at the website:

MOTH by Isabel Thomas and Daniel Egneius explores the science of natural selection and evolution using the peppered moth as an example.

The Story of the Peppered Moth from SciShow Kids is a short video that explores the peppered moth and natural selection.

SciShow Kids AZZ
https://youtu.be/jD8w3SOlYOk

ARC courtesy of Bloomsbury Children’s Books.

simple telling of peppered moth story of natural selection