Wily Violets & Underground Orchids [Paperback]

Peter Bernhardt (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 14, 1990

In this book, Peter Bernhardt takes us on a grand tour of the botanical realm, weaving engaging descriptions of the lovely shapes and intriguing habits of flowering plants with considerations of broader questions, such as why there are only six basic shapes of flowers and why the orchid family is so numerous and so bizarre. Everyone from amateur naturalists and gardeners to plant scientists will find Wily Violets and Underground Orchids a lively guide to botanical lore.

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

For nine years an "expatriate botanist" in South America and Australia, Bernhardt, now a botany instructor at St. Louis University, here shares a taste for botanical esoterica--with mixed results. His collection of essays, many published previously in magazines, enjoys the benefit but also bears the brunt of the author's somewhat arcane forays into "orchidelirium" and his unflagging, occasionally tiresome fascination with the pollination of exotic plant species, whether observed in the field or in the pages of Australian children's books (in one of these, "the costumes of minor characters reflect flowering and fruiting fashions within a number of sclerophyll habitats"). Though capable of communicating the botanist's passion for natural wonders, as well as explaining how plants function, the author does not always choose to do so, assuming both a knowledge of and an interest in the mechanics of plant life that many readers will not possess. At his best, however, Bernhardt recounts his "botanical romance" with Kansas grasslands and describes bees who, as pollinators, "appear to be comfortable only when they can visit a violet flower while standing on their heads." Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Some of the strangest behavior in nature occurs in plants. Writing in a popular style, Bernhardt (botany, St. Louis Univ.) mingles fact and history with his own observations of plants gained during travels in the United States, South America, and Australia. His absorbing account (based on previously published material) covers amazing conduct of both obscure and familiar plants, including seasonality and its consequences in a tropical, cyclically dry forest; Australian mistletoe, whose leaves mimic those of the trees with which they have a parasitic relationship; the ecology of our North American grasslands; pollination by mammals, beetles, and moths; Amazonian giant water lilies; the eccentric life of the common violet; and five chapters on the strangest plants of all, the orchids.
- Annette Aiello, Smithsonian Tropical Research Inst., Panama
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (July 14, 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679728929
• ISBN-13: 978-0679728924
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.2 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,191,522 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Peter Bernhardt was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1952 and grew up on Long Island. His interest in natural history developed thanks to the woodland reserve two blocks from his house separating the towns of Merrick and Freeport, his summer attendance at Meroke Day Camp and the influence of local plant breeder and garden designer, the late Joseph Reis. His indulgent parents allowed Peter to keep many small pets (birds, tropical fish, newts, turtles) as well as pots of cacti and succulents. His 1974 BA in Biology came from the State University of New York at Oswego and Peter credits his first attempt at botanical research (a project on how prickly pear cacti grow spines) to Professor James Seago. After taking his Masters Degree in Biology from the State University of New York at Brockport in 1975 Peter spent over two years in Peace Corps at the University of El Salvador in Central America collecting plants for the university's herbarium (plant museum), teaching undergraduate courses and conducting field studies on the pollination of the Gabriel flower (Echeandia macrocarpa). His first popular article on how wild orchids street trees and telephone poles in the city of San Salvador appeared in "Natural History Magazine." After a few months as a technician at the New York Botanical Garden in 1977 he was contributing articles to their now defunct magazine, "Garden." By 1977 he accepted a doctoral scholarship at the University of Melbourne, Australia, where he studied the breeding systems of box mistletoes (Amyema) under Malcolm Calder and the late Bruce Knox. He remains a Professor of Biology at Saint Louis University, Missouri (see his web page at the SLU Department of Biology) and a Research Associate of both the Missouri Botanical Garden (St. Louis) and the Royal Botanic Gardens of Sydney (Sydney, N.S.W., Australia). His fieldwork in pollination biology takes him to Kansas, Missouri and Oregon and abroad to Australia, Israel and China. A sabbatical in 2009 took him back to Australia where he and Retha Meier studied how blue sun orchids (Thelymitra) are pollinated by native bees and why blue-flowered species often hybridize with each other or with the yellow lemon orchid (Thelytmitra antennifera). Consequently, Dr. Bernhardt's books on plant life are often based on real experiences he's enjoyed in the field, the laboratory and his own home garden.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Inspiring botanic tales, August 9, 2000

By 

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

This review is from: Wily Violets and Underground Orchids: Revelations of a Botanist (Hardcover)

A series of eighteen unrelated botanical stories, usually introduced from some personal angle. There is a surprising amount of quite unusual information here, and eminently readable to anybody interested in plants, in pollination and in the ways plants have adapted to survive.

Sparingly illustrated by line drawings, of good quality, and some fair black & white photographs, augmented by eight pages of color photographs. Note: ISBN 0-688-08350-1 is the 1989 hard cover.