North American Trees-89-4-P*

by Richard J. Preston

This book covers the trees of North America with the exception of Mexico and tropical Florida. Increasing numbers of people are becoming interested in the trees and forests of North America. Regional... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0813811724
• ISBN13: 9780813811727
• Release Date: January 1989
• Publisher: Iowa State Press
• Length: 407 Pages
• Weight: 1.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 5.6" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

Very useful!

This 400 page book is a no-nonsense identification manual for north American trees exclusive of Mexico and tropical Florida (except for 35 species of hawthorn and 16 usually shrubby willows). It is adequately illustrated by drawings and distribution maps. Most of the species are described (habit, leaves, fruit, twigs, bark, general), some of the more uncommon ones are only mentioned in the keys. Although the book claims to use language as simple as possible I can imagine that it is the botanists who come to terms with it most easily. A real drawback can be found in one of the introductory keys (species with toothed leaves) where the identification relies heavily on fruit characters. This is no doubt scientifically accurate, but not very practical in the field. A less rigorous, user friendly approach would be preferable. I recommend the book to people with botanical training who will be happy to find the species arranged according to families and not according to the position of leaves. I liked the book because of its mostly very useful keys and because it presents all the north American trees in one easy-to-carry volume