Petrified Wood: The World of Fossilized Wood, Cones, Ferns, and Cycads [Hardcover]

Frank J. Daniels (Author), Brooks B. Britt (Editor), Richard D. Dayvault (Editor)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0966293800 | ISBN-13: 978-0966293807 | Publication Date: September 1, 1998 | Edition: 1st

176 pages with 430 full color photographs of some of the most beautiful fossil specimens in existence. Chapters include Paleobotany, Geology, Mineralogy, and Collecting Petrified Materials. Hundreds of specimens from private collections are for the first time available for public view.

Petrified Wood: The World of Fossilized Wood, Cones, Ferns, and Cycads presents photographs of fossil specimens from Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Madagascar, Turkey, and Zimbabwe, and from Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Louisiana, Nevada, Oregon, Texas, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming in the United States.

Photographs include a variety of types and genera of wood, including Araucaria, Woodworthia, Schilderia, Pentoxylon, Hermanophyton, oak, maple, tamarack, and Ginkgo; cones of Araucaria, Pararaucaria, Cycadeoidea, and Sequoia; and the ferns Tietea singularis, Tempskya, and Osmundacaulis.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A worthwhile addition to a general library collection." -- CHOICE - Current Reviews for Academic Libraries

"Fit for a coffee table, Petrified Wood: The World of Fossilized Wood, Cones, Ferns, and Cycads is functional and fascinating. Author Frank Daniels explores the beauty of time-honored nature through fluid language and brilliant photographs of rare, gem-quality petrified plants." -- The Daily Sentinel, August 23,1998

"This book is both a coffee table beauty and a most interesting and useful text." -- Rock & Gem magazine

'Petrified Wood' is beautifully illustrated and serves to introduce the novice to the gamut of fossil wood types.... For the professional paleobotanist, geologist, and paleontologist this illustrated survey of the major kinds of petrified woods from sites around the world can be quite useful.... A worthwhile addition to a general library collection. -- Choice

Rock & Gem magazine calls Petrified Wood "an exciting new book" with "superb photographs." "This book is both a coffee table beauty and a most interesting and useful text." "Most remarkable of all is the price: $75 for this attractive and useful 9-by-12-inch, 176 page book." -- Rock & Gem, November 1998

From the Author

Petrified wood from the United States resides in museums worldwide, yet most Americans know little about the subject. I wanted to publish a book that would present photographs of some of the world's most beautiful and interesting specimens and also explain how these miraculous fossils form in such a vast array of colors and mineralization. Over the past several years I traveled thousands of miles and shot more than 7,500 photographs to produce this book. I also spent many late evening hours researching. The book's editors are recognized experts in their fields. Dr. Brooks Britt is Curator for Paleontology at The Museum of Western Colorado and Mr. Dayvault is a professional geologist with a long-standing involvement in the study of western minerals and fossils.

I hope that the quality of materials and construction are readily apparent. The paper is 100# glossy bond. While most mineral and fossil books have only small sections printed in full color, this book is 100% full color. The large format (the pages are 9" by 12") is well justified by the size of the photographs. We wasted no space in producing this book. Details such as the full color, printed end sheets are expensive additions, but well worth it in my opinion. Please remove the dust jacket to view the gold embossed design on the hard cover. Printing and binding the book entirely in the USA was also an expense with clearly visible dividends. Since the printing was done in my hometown of Grand Junction, Colorado, I could monitor every step of the process. The photographs were all shot on a fine grain, slow speed professional film (Fuji Velvia, rated at ISO 40) without the use of color-enhancing filters other than a polarizer. We spent many hours color correcting to ensure that the pictures in the book match the colors in the original transparencies.

I hope you will agree with me that this book fills a void. Get on the Internet at www.amazon.com and search for petrified wood - of 2,500,000 titles available none were available on petrified wood until now. Check the library of Congress or any other library system catalog with the same results. You will find some textbooks on paleobotany that address petrified materials in technical, dry terms, and you will see a few books about Petrified Forest National Park and similar places, but you will not find a book like this. That is why I wrote it.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 176 pages
• Publisher: Western Colorado Publishing Company; 1st edition (September 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0966293800
• ISBN-13: 978-0966293807
• Product Dimensions: 12 x 9.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #980,776 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Petrified Wood: The World of Fossilized Wood, February 1, 2000

By 

Paul Tierney (Brisbane, Australia.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Petrified Wood: The World of Fossilized Wood, Cones, Ferns, and Cycads (Hardcover)

The best photographic presentation of petrified wood I have every seen. Frank Daniels' love of the subject can be seen in his work as laid out between the covers of this superb book. I totally enjoy showing non palaeontologically minded people this book when they visit. If a person is looking for a photographic presentation of petrified wood, then this would have to be the book. I heartily recommend it. Congratulations Frank on a terrific book.

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Blaze of color, October 11, 2000

By 

P. van Rijckevorsel (The Netherlands) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Petrified Wood: The World of Fossilized Wood, Cones, Ferns, and Cycads (Hardcover)

As the various reviews point out this book is a blaze of color. Excellently photographed and excellently printed this volume gives a good impression of how beautiful petrified wood can be. This work is perfectly suited as a coffee table book.

As a wood anatomist I cannot help feeling that an even more beautiful book could be produced by shifting the focus to anatomy: when magnified these woods would look even better. I guess a palaeobotanist would agree with me that this would make for, from a scientific point of view, a more usable and valuable book.

Nevertheless this is a magnificent piece of work: there are some quite stunning pictures in here.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars PETRIFIED WOOD by Frank J Daniels, August 23, 2008

By 

James E. Roberts "jimstones" (Bay Area California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Petrified Wood: The World of Fossilized Wood, Cones, Ferns, and Cycads (Hardcover)

This is a beautiful volume that is a visual treat for any enthusiast in the area of geology, paleontology, rocks and minerals. It's an attractive "coffee table" book replete with page after page of gorgeous color plates of the world's loveliest petrified wood specimens. There are also text portions that explain the geology and history of the fossilized wood. Some of the paleobiological terms are quite technical. It's not for everyone, but the book is beautiful for those with eyes that find fascination in ancient trees that have now turned to mineralized stone.