Alvin Breisch in his book released this month, “The Snake and the Salamander: Reptiles and Amphibians from Maine to Virginia,” uses a lifetime of knowledge to make creatures many consider “second-class citizens” vivid and vital — an essential part of the natural world that often go unrecognized.

The monarch massacre — the billion butterflies that made the epic flight from the eastern United States to Mexico each fall has fallen to only about 33 million — should served to warn us like the proverbial canary in the coal mine.