Reviews (1)

A "MUST HAVE" for any Botanical Art Enthusiast or Artist
This book, illustrated by Marilena Pistoia, is an invaluable addition to the library of botanical artists or lovers of botanical art. There are 110 paintings depicting 400 plants, fruits, vegetables, herbs, and spices...all beautifully painted and reproduced. Some of the fruits are so realistic they almost make your mouth water. Read more

Subjects:  1. Cooking    2. Food crops    3. Life Sciences - Botany    4. Pictorial works    5. Plants, Edible    6. Science    7. Non-Classifiable    8. Sale Books   

Editorial Review

Working in his garden one day, Michael Pollan hit pay dirt in the form of an idea: do plants, he wondered, use humans as much as we use them? While the question is not entirely original, the way Pollan examines this complex coevolution by looking at the natural world from the perspective of plants is unique. The result is a fascinating and engaging look at the true nature of domestication.Read more

Reviews (125)

Readable copy and interesting hypothesis.
A long book on botany if you are up to it. For a more compact and lively study try The Story of the Apple.

An engaging piece of practical history

A Three Hundred Page Sleeping Pill
I was given three months to read this book, and each time I picked it up I threw it down in disgust.Between the none-stop Johnny Appleseed referances to the Collegian's Guide to Growing Pot, it is amazing I got through it.I am convinced he was once a Columbian drug lord. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Ecology    2. Gardening / Horticulture    3. History    4. Human-plant relationships    5. Life Sciences - Botany    6. Nature    7. Plants    8. Plants - General    9. Science/Mathematics    10. Nature / Plants   

Reviews (22)

Northeast Weed Bible
This book is absolutely the best on weeds of the Northeast. This is a must forthe library of every gardener or landscaper. It is easily readable, yet has the depth for those who need greater information about the subject. Easily, the most practical format, and it has a detailed index for cross referencing between the common and taxonomic. It also includes a chart on grasses.

Usefull reference book for weeds
I am a member of the Master Gardeners of Harford Co. Maryland.
Answers to "what's this? what's that?" but not all of them
I love this book!I had to have my own copy after seeing one in use at the Cooperative Extension's Master Gardener booth at last year's 4-H Fair.It doesn't ID everything that I find growing around my property, of course, and I definitely agree with S.C. Watson's wishes for information on edibility and invasiveness.Still, this is a terrific book.
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Subjects:  1. Canada, Eastern    2. Gardening    3. Gardening/Plants    4. Identification    5. Life Sciences - Botany    6. Nature    7. Northeastern States    8. Plants - General    9. Regional - General    10. Weeds    11. Horticulture    12. Northeastern & North Atlantic states    13. Pest control   

Reviews (5)

Best Plant Biol. book out there
I am a PhD candidate in Plant Sciences and I work with both applied and basic researchers who work on all aspects of plant biology/agriculture etc.Everyone I work with and myself included feel that this is the best single plant biology text. It is a few years old now so some of the mol. biology will be outdated, and a couple of examples have since been proven to be different than described in the book, but this is minor. This is for the adv. undergrad or graduate student and if you are a graduate student in plant biology you should have this book-it is very expensive, but nearly every post-doc/grad student I know has a copy. Get the hardcover it will hold up better.

Biochemistry & Molecular Biology of Plants
Mr. !!! Explanations not very comprehensive
The text covers a wide variety of plant molecular biology which is convienent. However the explanations are often very vague and do not connect with each other. When reading a paragraph you are often left with unanswered questions and the next paragraph may not connect with the previous paragraph at all. Not at all recommended for the beginner or undergraduate. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Life Sciences - Botany    2. Science    3. Science/Mathematics    4. Genetics (non-medical)    5. Plant physiology    6. Science / Botany   

Reviews (11)

Visual Impact
Botany books use too many big words and not enough illustrations. This book clarifies the meanings of those big words with attractive drawings.

very informative
If you need to identify any plants using a taxonomic key or any other botanical guide, this book helps enormously to clarify the technical terms.It's like learning another language and this book is your dictionary.

Useful book
This was required reading for my California Ecosystems class and its many illustrations and definitions were extremely useful when we used a dichotemous key in class. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Botany    2. Dictionaries    3. Identification    4. Life Sciences - Botany    5. Plants    6. Science    7. Science/Mathematics    8. Terminology    9. Plant introduction   

Reviews (6)

A lot of text but many unanswered questions
I take no issue with Christian Ratsch. He is a prolific writer and someone with influence in the world of ethnobotany. However, I want to write a valuable and honest review here. This book is enormous. I know of no other book worth buying that contains as many plants as this one (in relation to a mind enhancing context). In this regard, the book is highly valuable. There are also plenty of photos which give it an artistic quality.
All in one place.
Save time and research.This book is huge and packed.Has information on just about any natural drug source legal or not.This book is so big and packed full of information it would be hard to ever get tired of thumbing through this book.

Perfect
This book is absolutely essential for anyone interested in the topic of entheogens and their use/history. Buy it now! ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Anthropology - Cultural    2. Body, Mind & Spirit    3. Encyclopedias    4. Ethopharmacology    5. Healing - General    6. Herbal Medications    7. Life Sciences - Botany    8. Medical Anthropology    9. Nature    10. New Age    11. Pharmacodynamics    12. Plants - General    13. Psychiatry - Psychopharmacology    14. Psychotropic plants    15. Botany & plant sciences    16. Drug-induced states    17. Medical / Drug Guides    18. Pharmacology    19. Reference works   

Reviews (4)

The Best Yet
We're redoing our large backyard water-wise, and this is by far the best book I've found to help us along.The pictures are clear and well-described, the checklists come in very handy, but the "specialty plant groupings" really did it for me.I'm using this in conjunction with my Sunset Western Garden Book, which has good information but misses several of the elements I found in Perry's book.

Great reference book
Essential for landscape architects, great reference book due to Perry's knowledge in plants.

the holy bible of Southern California gardens
Two years ago I had a hillside full of fire hazardous weeds and no knowledge of gardening.After a four day ordeal of clearing the brush I decided to plant the hillside and knew next to nothing about what wouldgrow there, how to plant the shrubs, how much to water and what pests mightattack. I only knew I wanted to use California natives but I didn't knowany names and the only latin I remembered was from my Catholic boyhood.After a one hour session with a garden consultant and visits to theTheodore Payne foundation I discovered Bob Perry's books and a whole worldopened up to me. Mr. Perry is a legend in gardening circles and thisbeautiful book is the fount of much wisdom. Everything I have learned aboutgardening in these two years I learned from Bob Perry and my plants. I havescoured the immense gardening book collection at Central libary (thelargest west of the Mississippi) and find this book to be the cream of thecrop. Not only are the color pictures terribly important in making choices,the advice is impeccable and the variety offered is exhaustive.Thanks toMr. Perry and his superb books I now have a garden of some seventy natives,all doing well and giving me great joy. Some day I would like to meet theman and shake his hand but for now I can only recommend his books highly. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Life Sciences - Botany    2. Reference    3. Science   

Subjects:  1. Agriculture - General    2. Business/Economics    3. Entrepreneurship    4. Leadership    5. Technology & Industrial Arts    6. Science / Horticulture   

Reviews (3)

Fantastic
Take a really dry subject and turn it into a book I couldn't put down!
Wonderful book for intuitive understanding of the subject
In the opening chapter, this book presents a wonderful simplified story of the evolution of plants, from a single cell to modern complex flowers.Both children and adults can gain a unique, intuitive understanding of this process from this explanation. My compliments to the author.He describes each plant family with interesting anecdotes and high quality line drawings.It's the first plant book whose lack of photographs didn't matter.Great tips for identifying families and individual plants have helped me enormously.Bravo!

Teaches the patterns method of plant identification
Any interested in plant identification should consider Botany In A Day: The Patterns Method Of Plant Identification as an important guide. Thomas Elpel (Director of Hollowtop Outdoor Primitive School, Pony, Montana) deftly teaches the patterns method of plant identification, providing a method for learning about groupings of plants based on the idea that related plants have similar patterns for identification, and similar uses. Black and white line drawings accompany descriptions of different plant families and their identification processes.
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Subjects:  1. Flowers    2. Life Sciences - Botany    3. Nature    4. Nature / Plants    5. Nature/Ecology    6. Plants - General    7. Plants   

Subjects:  1. Dictionaries    2. Grasses    3. Life Sciences - Botany    4. Plants - Grasses    5. Reference    6. Science    7. Science/Mathematics    8. Botany & plant sciences    9. Reference works    10. Science / Botany   

Reviews (8)

Best Gardening problem solver you will every get.
From amateur to pro, this text of gardening problems, from the most delicate plant and flowers to the most complicated forms of trees and shrubs, this book covers all.Also as a hardbound, it is an excellent additon to any library.
Great reference book
I have a chemical lawn/tree & shrub business, and I use it.The only negative I can see is that the Home Gardener's Problem Solver covers most of this book for $30. That said, I gave my techs the home gardener's version and kept this one for myself.

Comprehensive except for lack of Organiccontrol methods
"The Ortho Problem Solver" is a wonderful reference book on pests, fungus', etc and controlling them with inorganic methods.Of course, Ortho is not known for organic pest control, but I still feel that maybe they should include this information considering that many that wish to control certain pests also live in wildlife areas--such as areas where there are birds, or are environmentalists or oriented towards this area when it comes to certain issues such as vegetables and fruit.Read more

Subjects:  1. Agricultural Chemistry    2. Gardening    3. Gardening / Horticulture    4. Gardening/Plants    5. Life Sciences - Horticulture    6. Pest Control In Horticultural Crops    7. Reference    8. Gardening / Reference    9. Gardening: plants    10. problem   

Subjects:  1. Dermatology    2. Life Sciences - Botany    3. Medical    4. Medical / Nursing    5. Medical / Dermatology    6. Surgical techniques   

Subjects:  1. Agriculture - Agronomy    2. Agriculture - Crop Science    3. Agriculture - General    4. Botany (General)    5. Botany, Economic    6. Life Sciences - Botany    7. Life Sciences - Horticulture    8. Plants, Cultivated    9. Science    10. Science/Mathematics    11. Technology & Industrial Arts    12. Agriculture & Farming    13. Technology / Agriculture & Animal Husbandry   

Subjects:  1. Consumer Health    2. Handbooks, manuals, etc    3. Herbal Medications    4. Materia medica, Vegetable    5. Medical    6. Medicinal plants    7. Plants, Medicinal    8. Reference    9. Traditional medicine    10. Traditional medicine & remedies   

Reviews (30)

Regional but excellent
Definitely a regional book.If you travel in N. Georgia up to New England, this is a must-have guide.The black and white line drawings do aid in identifying plants having structure and shape as the defining characteristic because light and shade of color do not come into play as they might in photos.As in birding, the preference for either photos or drawings is an individual one and, until Newcomb's landed in my library, I used photo guides for wildflowers but preferred drawn guides (like Peterson's) for birds.This is the book that changed my mind on that point.
Newcomb's Wildflower Guide
Two types of flower-identification books are available, those that use pure pattern recognition and those that require you to look at the flower. Pattern recognition books usually have pretty pictures of flowers arranged by color and then require you to search many pages to find one that looks like your flower. Newcomb's takes an alternative approach; it requires that you actually look at the flower. The key system is simple to use; for example, how many petals does it have, do the leaves alternate or are they on opposite sides of the stem, is it an herb, bush, or vine, etc. Only after narrowing down the possibilities extensively do you arrive at the pattern recognition stage and have only a few possibilities from which to choose. I have methodically found the names of several different flowers that I could not find even after exhaustive searches of other books. The book is not filled with pretty pictures, it is filled with information and excellent, simple line art.

Great Guide
If all the drawings in this book were in color, then this book would be hard to beat.I love this guide, but sometimes I have to reference a book with color pictures to be certain of an identification. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Climbing plants    2. Flowers    3. General    4. Identification    5. Nature    6. Nature/Ecology    7. Northeastern States    8. Shrubs    9. Wild flowers    10. Nature / General    11. Trees & wildflowers   

Reviews (7)

Nothing compares
I own and operate a nursery using both of these books as a primary resource when purchasing conifers from growers.When customers refer to these books at our library, they comment on how beautiful the many conifers are available.My only wish the book had w/b zone hardiness and growth habit.Buy it.ProGardens, Inc.East Amherst, New York.

Conifers : The Illustrated Encyclopedia (Two Volume Set)
Two world authorities compiled this outstanding conifer book featuring 2347 excellent, sharp photos reproduced beautifully on high quality paper.Each picture was taken at the proper distance to show the tree's outstanding detail.Captions are a sentence or two with location oftenincluded.For detail use a good companion book such as the Manual ofCultivated Conifers by Krussmann.Imperative for landscapers and a joy fortree lovers -- a bargain at the cover price.A quality bookclearly at the top of my list of favorites.

great book to figure out what you have growing in your yard.
pictures are great !!butlacks the necessary info on growing,care,climate zones&changes of sasons on the plants.but i love it for all it'svisual contents ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Conifers    2. Gardening    3. Gardening / Horticulture    4. Gardening/Plants    5. Ornamental conifers    6. Pictorial works    7. Reference    8. Trees    9. Botany & plant sciences    10. Gardening / Trees    11. Horticulture    12. Reference works    13. Shrubs & trees   

Subjects:  1. Agriculture - General    2. Architecture    3. General    4. Landscape    5. Landscape architecture    6. Landscape gardening    7. Landscaping industry    8. Life Sciences - Horticulture    9. Science    10. Science/Mathematics    11. Agricultural science    12. Landscape art & architecture    13. Technology / Agriculture & Animal Husbandry   

Reviews (17)

Less than stellar
I was disappointed to find that there was no useful information contained therein. While the pictures were very well done there were no colloquial names to help identify species.

Good supplemental book
I own about a dozen mushroom books and have recently added this one to my collection. "Shooming" can be a dangerous pursuit and, like almost all are aware, absolute identification is required. I don't think I would personally feel competent with this book alone, nor any other for that matter. I feel there are better books but these are very heavy monstrosities. This one, like a few, can be carried into the field while the larger, more definitive guides await at home, or in the car. The pictures are good but I prefer a "Peterson Guide" type approach to indicate what, exactly, I should be looking for. My only other personal objection is that I prefer a guide that uses their Latin name since this knowledge will be more easily transferable from one book to another.
A poor choice
I purchased this book becase it said Audubon.Thus I expected much more than I received. I was hoping to identify a few mushrooms I had found in my area.After spending a great deal of time, I was able to identify none.There are far better pictures available in other books.For instance the picture of the Shaggy Mane does not look at all like the Shags I have collected and eaten.All in all, a waste of money. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Canada    2. Fungi    3. Identification    4. Mushrooms    5. Nature    6. Nature/Ecology    7. United States    8. Botany & plant sciences    9. Nature / Mushrooms    10. North America    11. Trees & wildflowers   

Reviews (5)

The Best Technical Review of California Plants
There is no easy way to identify a plant to species, but if it is in California it is far easier to use this volume than the others. Although it was written in 1925, the line drawings are for me priceless. Be advised that names change in 75 years even if plants do not, you will need a modern flora to reference the old name. HIGHLY recommended, but technical.

Good Reference and Learning Guide
This is an excellent guide.Very comprehensive, however you must have formal education in botany and plant ID in order to effectively use the guide to key plants to genus and or species.Not recommended for the average person.Just people who are plant nerds!

Not for the uninitiated
This book is an excellent botanical key listing a huge number of plants. It is not your average "audubon" guide, since it requires you to key out the plant in question using botanical systematics. Definitely a good reference book, but hard to use casually to find out what that tree is in your front yard! ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Botany    2. California    3. General    4. Identification    5. Life Sciences - Botany    6. Nature    7. Nature/Ecology    8. Pictorial works    9. Plant Geography    10. Plants    11. Botany & plant sciences    12. Plant life: general    13. Reference works    14. Science / Biology    15. USA   

Reviews (4)

Great art book
Wonderful book showing many of Harper's prints as well as a paragraph about each written by him.

A Delightful Mixture of Art, Science, and Humor
Beguiled by the Wild is a complete collection of limited edition prints by wildlife artist Charley Harper that spans three decades of his career.The captions printed in the book are the original versions that were issued with each print. The prints have long been sold out and this book represents the only published collection of his work. A rare self-interview and introduction by Roger Caras are the only additional text. Each page brings to life an example of Charley's unique ability to combine humor, art, and science. Readers will be hard-pressed to flip through the pages of this coffee table book without stopping at almost every page to learn the message inherent with each piece. Charley's unusual style, which he calls "minimal realism", catches the eye and draws a smile. Often a maze of bright colors and geometric shapes dominates the scene making an initial interpretation puzzling. Reading the caption usually provides insight into the biology of selected insects, birds and mammals, which is often whimsical and always factual. "Armadittos", for example, depicts and inverted armadillo mother suckling a line of four pups in a circle of pine needles. The caption describes how armadillos always reproduce with four genetically identical quaruplets of the same sex(and they live in pine forests of the southern states).Similary, "Jesus Bugs" depicts a group ofwater strider insects with large circles surrounding each of their six feet, which also form circular shadows under the water. Only an entomologist would know that these circles represent depressions on the water surface caused by minute foot hairs that keep the insects from sinking. This artist has attracted a large audience of amateur and professional biologists who should get their hands on a copy of this book before it too goes out of print.

Great Coffee table book for lovers of animals & modern art
This is a wonderful coffee table book for anyone who loves animals and modern art. In his unusual style, the artist brings animals to life with geometric precision. The more I look at the art, the more I like it.Read more

Subjects:  1. American wit and humor, Pictor    2. American wit and humor, Pictorial    3. Art    4. Art & Art Instruction    5. Catalogs    6. General    7. Harper, Charley    8. History - Modern (Late 19th Century to 1945)    9. Individual Artist    10. Individual Painters - Contemporary    11. United States    12. Wildlife art    13. Trees & wildflowers