Customer Reviews

Plant

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I was hoping this would be the botanical answer to "Animal." Boy, was I wrong.

The book's shortcomings are enormous. For starters, most of the information provided is about the conservation and gardening of plants. Usually, an entry leads off with a couple lines about the plant's appearance, and what kind of habitat it lives in. (Sometimes this information is tucked deep into the entry, however -- or even left to a one-sentence picture caption.) The rest of the text will be spent on conservation information and cultivation tips.

Don't get me wrong: I am very much committed to conservation ("Animal" had very good information on this score), and gardens are a joy. But I had hoped to LEARN something ABOUT THE PLANTS THEMSELVES. (What makes this plant distinctive? How is it related to other plants? How do it's strange-looking roots work? etc.) On this score, the book outright fails, and fails miserably. There are a few occasions where it goes into more detail than others, but overall, it's just not much help. See, for but two examples, oaks (genus Quercus) or baobabs (Adansonia). If you want to know, say, why acorns have caps, or how baobabs store water, you're out of luck.

Aside from the general lack of information related to anything other than conservation and gardening, the organization is not particularly helpful, either. The entries are organized into groups like "Herbaceous Plants" and "Trees and Shrubs." While these groupings might be useful to garders, they're not scientific, and they don't tell you anything about what sets different groups of plants apart from one another. In other words, you don't get a very good idea of plant diversity and interrelationships.

Finally, there are some omissions that I found just mind-boggling. Saguaros, for example, get a couple picture captions, and that's about it. Want to know why they're so big, or whether and how their size requires them to do things differently from other cacti? Tough. Mosses are also all but completely ignored.

I guess that from a garderner's perspective, maybe the book is great. Maybe that's the intended audience, and maybe it deserves five stars from those who want to know how to grow, say, monkey puzzle trees.

But if you want to know about what exactly a monkey puzzle tree is, about what's so unique about it and how it works -- in short, if you're familiar with "Animal" and want a plant book that resembles it -- then I think you'll be VERY disappointed. I certainly was.

"By now, most people know that we're poised on the brink of a biological disaster that could rival anything in evolutionary history...what most gardeners don't realize is that, if current trends continue, a devastating number of the world's flowering plants could be extinct in the coming decades." ~Janet Marinelli

Janet Marinelli and a team of botanists showcase over 2,000 of the planet's rarest and most imperiled plant species. Can these plants be saved by ordinary gardeners? When plants have been dug up from natural areas they can threaten or deplete the natural resources. Whereas, a collection of orchids could be an important gene pool for more rare species. Some plants like the Chocolate Cosmos is only found in gardens and was last seen in its native habitat back in 1902. Private gardens can become a refuge for plants that might otherwise now be extinct.

Janet Marinell is on the forefront of the ecological revolution and has been the Director of Publishing at Brooklyn Botanic Garden for the past decade. She has won numerous awards for her writing, including the American Gardener Award. She is a popular lecturer on the subject of ecological garden design and plant conservations. By request, she makes frequent appearances across the U.S. and abroad to pass along her philosophy and gardening techniques.

From the first page you realize you are about to be immersed in a magical book filled with page after page of rare plants you might never see in your lifetime unless you found them in this book. The contents include beautiful sections on:

The Evolution of Plants
The Extinction Crisis
Protecting Natural Areas
Natural Gardening
Temperate and Boreal Forests
Wet Grasslands
Deserts
Trees and Shrubs
Climbing Plants
Alpine Plants
Ferns
Palms and Cycads
Carnivorous Plants
A-Z of Invasive Plants

There are many unique features in this book but the most impressive part is the pictures of fields of exotic flowers, maps to show locations and explorations of each global habitat. The authors explore how plants have vastly impacted human societies and also presents plant classification that is easy to understand.

PLANT explores the stunning world we live in and introduces the reader to exotic landscapes, forests drenched in mist and flowering plants you will fall in love with and want to save. The vulnerable yellow angels' trumpets emit a powerful fragrance that lures in night-flying butterflies while strange blooms of green cactus-like sunflowers grow from the Dorstenia. Larch "flowers" are born from bark like visual poetry and many of the plants we know about are also on the lists of plants that could become extinct. Like the more familiar Japanese magnolia, Echniacea or Ginkgo biloba. You may want to cultivate your own passionflowers or plant more bulbs.

There is a lot to think about. Like, who hasn't sprinkled a wildflower mix into a part of their yard or in a field. There is information about a poppy seed that self-seed vigorously and it is found in "wildflower" seed mixes. It can compete with grasslands and can be very invasive, although stunningly beautiful.

A portion of the proceeds for this book will go to plant conservation efforts. This is truly an "ultimate guide" that will inspire your protective instincts. These plants are beautiful and deserve to be saved.

~The Rebecca Review

The subtitle of this beautiful, oversized book is The Ultimate Visual Reference to Plants and Flowers of the World. The back cover calls the book "a spectacular A-Z survey of the world's plants from a gardener's perspective" and calls it "the essential guide to plants for today's responsible gardener." In addition to approximately 2,000 color illustrations, the book contains explanations of the origin of each plant, its habitat, and the conditions a plant needs in your garden and why. Plants that are under threat of extinction are identified, and gardeners are told how they can help ensure these plants' survival. (summary by South Texas Library System)
I love that you can always count on DK for a quality book with stunning graphics.

Do not look at it as a biological treatise for plants. It contains great pictures and talks about plants and habitats in general. You want to have a casual read during some lazy afternoon this is a book for you.

PLANT IS WITHOUT QUESTION THE MOST VISUALLY BEAUTIFUL PLANT BOOK AVAILABLE. IT'S FILLED WITH GLORIOUS EYE POPPING PHOTOGRAPHS COVERING ENTIRE PAGES. ENTRIES AND INFORMATION ARE ILLUSTRATED WITH MORE BEAUTIFUL PHOTOS; ALL IN FULL COLOR. IT IS A WONDERFUL BROUSERS BOOK. iN ADDITION TO THAT IT PRESENTS A HUGE AMOUNT OF INFORMATION ABOUT HABITATS, HISTORY AND THE FUTURE PROBLEMS FACING PLANTS. ANYONE WHO HAS AN INTEREST IN PLANTS WILL WANT TO READ THIS BOOK FROM COVER TO COVER.

Plants are essential to our existence. We eat plants. We build using plants. This book will open your eyes to the beauty of these all-important living things. You will be amazed at how much you know and how much you don't know about plant life. Plants provide a balance in nature that would otherwise not be possible. Without plants, there would be no agriculture and our economic systems would cease to function. So human civilization owes its existence to plants. Animals rely on plants also for their growth and nourishment. We need to stop thinking of plants as stationary bodies with no feeling and embrace them as part of God's creation that we simply couldn't live without. Plant will awaken us to that appreciation.