Product Description: An exquisitely illustrated, lively exploration of Latin plant names explaining the meanings behind hundreds of names, from vulgaris ("common") to mirabilis ("extraordinary") Every gardener needs to know their Latin names. They may look confusing at first, but once you understand what certain key words mean, impenetrable sounding and hard-to-pronounce species names are suddenly demystified...read more

Product Description: An authoritative guide book to more than 70 of Alaska's most common wild edible plants.Tuck this guide into a backpack, glove compartment, or pocket and use its color photographs and habitat and plant descriptions to help you discover the bounty of the land and its plants around you...read more

Although sponges are one of the major components of littoral ecosystems, their systematics obviously lags behind that of the majority of other groups of marine invertebrates. Also the evolutionary trends in these most primitive of the Metazoans are poorly understood. The confused state of their taxonomy and the difficulties with their identification prevent their use in ecological studies. The emphasis of interest presently seems to have shifted towards chemistry, but many of the hundreds of interesting chemicals recently described in sponges pro­ bably have been found in mistakenly or imprecisely identified animals. This situ­ ation will become worse in the next few years, when a number of experts will retire and will not be replaced by new ones, owing to the difficulties that the science of systematics is facing in most countries - as exemplified during this meeting by an informal discussion on the endangered future of European Museums. Under these circumstances, it is the responsability of present sponge taxono­ mists to leave a less confused state and tools such as simple fauna or computerized data bases to generations following. These tools do not exist even in one of the best studied areas, the North-Eastern Atlantic (including the Mediterranean Sea).

Examines philodendrons, anthuriums, Swiss cheese plants, and other aroids, and discusses their anatomy, evolution, distribution, and habitats (view table of contents)

Product Description: International experts worked for nearly two decades to produce this greatest single source of information on maples. Every known maple is described, including growth habit, distribution, hardiness, and autumn color, as well as useful information on culture, propagation, and pests and diseases...read more

Product Description: The focus of the present edition has been to further consolidate the information on the principles of plant systematic, include detailed discussion on all major systems of classification, and significantly, also include discussion on the selected families of vascular plants, without sacrificing the discussion on basic principles...read more

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Product Description: “If you have any interest in life beyond your own, you should read this book.”—Paul R. Ehrlich, author of The Dominant Animal  Biologist Rob Dunn’s Every Little Thing is the story of man’s obsessive quest to catalog life, from nanobacteria to new monkeys...read more

Product Description: To be published in 30 volumes, Flora of North America represents the first and only comprehensive taxonomic guide to the extraordinary diversity of plant life blanketing our continent north of Mexico. The collaborative effort of more than 30 major U...read more