Customer Reviews

Alaska's Wild Berries and Berry-Like Fruit

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Very informative book. Pictures are clear for identifying plants. Pocket size is a plus!

This tidy, pocket sized book is the perfect companion for hikes and camping adventures. The pictures are clear and in color with nice views of leaves and stalks so that identification may be obtained even while a plant is not bearing fruit. This is an excellent choice if you're serious about safely tasting the unknown.

I grew up in Alaska and LOVE berries. I live in Boston now and make it back to Alaska every other year. A couple years ago, I came home with my girlfriend and we did a four day hike near Denali. The forest service had this book at the office near the start of the hike. Thank goodness! I recognized immediately that it was a good book because it fit in the pocket of my rain jacket. As we started hiking, I pulled out the guide. It was early October and the berries were in full form. Over the period of the four day hike, we delighted upon fourteen different kinds of berries. Every one we were able to positively identify within a couple of minutes, thanks to the guide. We found a few poisonous/inedible berries and we were able to quickly identify them as well.

I have searched high and low for comparable field guides for other areas in the world. I haven't found anything even close. Most books are too big, with too many unhelpful pictures. Verna's book has a razor-sharp focus: what berries can I safely eat on my hike.

Buy this book. Use it. And then frame the pictures you take of all the smiling, berry-covered faces.

This book is a must if you spend anytime outdoors in Alaska. It's sectioned off by berry color, shows the plant while bearing fruit as well as without so you can identify the plants even out of season. It shows which are edible and which aren't as well as shares some of the uses for each, such as some are good for jams and jellies, others aren't as flavorful but make a nice extender in recipes. I lost my first copy a few years ago and HAD to get another one. I highly recommend it!

This pocket-sized book is a great small field guide to several varieties of Alaska's edible, inedible, and poisonous berries.

This was my first field guide of any sort and introduced me to foraging for edible berries, a hobby I have had ever since. I picked up this small gem somewhere in Denali National Park and it assisted me in identifying many species in both the tundra and boreal forest. It is very easy to use and, as previously mentioned, is of a small size and makes a great hiking companion for your bag or pocket.

Each entry contains at least two beautiful color photographs (usually one each of the flower and the berry) along with descriptions of the plant's habitat, form, leaves, flowers, fruits, notes that detail the berry's uses, and a simple map of Alaska detailing where the plant could be found. The entries are organized by color of the berry and edibility, indicated both by text and a smiley face (happy for edible, indifferent for possibly palatable, and sad for poisonous). This is very handy and helps make this guide easy to use for even a young berry-enthusiast.

I highly value this guide.