AuthorsBookshop.com: Landscape Plants For South Florida

Paul J. Erdek, floridagardener.com:

"Another great feature of this book is that every plant has a quick reference text box which gives the reader, at a glance, the particulars of the plant..."

-FULL REVIEW-
Landscape Plants for South Florida, a Manual for Gardeners, Landscapers & Homeowners is a 422 page hardbound book featuring many high quality color photographs of plants specifically for South Florida landscapes. This book covers a huge number of plants, but not every plant cultivar is listed as �the number of cultivars grown in South Florida is enormous, over 1,000� and growing. A manual that includes every one would be difficult if not impossible to put into a single volume. What you will not find in this book are specialty plants such as Orchids, Bromeliads, Heliconias, Begonias and such which a gardener may easily find volumes of other manuals devoted to. What you will find in this manual are the �vast majority of significant species cultivated in South Florida.� Plant families are presented alphabetically from Acanthaceae (Acanthus) to Zygophyllaceae (Caltrop). Plant English (or Common) and Botanical names are conveniently indexed in the back of the manual.

The feature of this book that I think is the most awesome and valuable is each plant�s botanical name is listed and under that is a pronunciation (pro�nun�ci�a�tion) guide. I find this immensely valuable because even though I was in the landscape maintenance business years ago and have had FloridaGardener.com online for over 10 years now, I am almost embarrassed to admit that I, THE FloridaGardener, have spent the better part of my career mispronouncing a majority of these plant�s botanical names! The biggest reason for this is that many of the garden plant guides that you find out there will list the botanical names of plants, but fail to give the user any clues as to how these names are pronounced. Landscape Plants for South Florida does an excellent job of not only providing the correct pronunciation of these botanical names, but in every case gives an explanation of how and why these plants received their botanical names. These explanations are oftentimes fascinating in themselves. For example, the Pinwheel-Jasmine�s botanical name (page 34) is Tabernaemontana divaricata (TAB-er-knee-mon-TAN-ah die-vair-ah-CATE-ah). This is the �generic name for Jakob Theodor von Bergzebern, who Latinized his name to Tabernaemontanus."

Another great feature of this book is that every plant has a quick reference text box which gives the reader, at a glance, the particulars of the plant including Botanical Name, English Name, whether a Florida Native or not, Growth Form, Flowering Season, Typical Dimensions, Suggested Spacing, Cultural Conditions, and any Cultural Problems to be concerned about regarding insects, diseases and so forth.

I enjoyed Dr. Rogers� Garden Guru articles sprinkled throughout the book. If you are not familiar with these articles, pick up a Sunday edition of Palm Beach Post and look for them in the Florida Home Residences section of the paper.

The only thing that I did not like about Landscape Plants for South Florida is that at first I had to continuously flip to page vi in the front of the book to use the Abbreviation Key. The easiest way to deal with this is to Xerox the page on a copier and use it as a bookmark until you become familiar with the abbreviations. Other than that slight issue, I highly recommend that you order a copy of Landscape Plants for South Florida, a Manual for Gardeners, Landscapers & Homeowners from www.plantbook.org for your gardening library.

Review online at http://floridagardener.com/DNN/FGGardenBlog/tabid/59/EntryID/51/Default.aspx

Carol Cloud Bailey, Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers:

"Overall, I find this book an excellent resource for the budding horticulturist, professionals and those who are just starting to garden."

-FULL REVIEW-
Plant books are as plentiful as sandspurs. Yet, I often hear complaints about the lack of good books about plants for our area. The question of what to plant also haunts me. Now there is a resource to answer these concerns.

The Environmental Horticulture Program at Palm Beach Community College has published �Landscape Plants for South Florida: A Manual for Gardeners, Landscapers and Homeowners.�

This book is a long-term project of the faculty, staff, students and friends of the department and edited by George Rogers, who received his doctorate in botany from the University of Michigan and did postdoctoral work at Harvard University. Rogers is the chair of the environmental horticulture department and specializes in plant identification.

More than 500 native and non-native plants are featured in the book. The plants are arranged by family and there is a profile for each which contains information about the identification, growth needs, size, flowering, spacing and natural range. Some of the information is set in a table, which is easy to read. I particularly like the sections with typical and recommended landscape uses. Invasive species as determined by the Florida Exotic Pest Plant Council are clearly marked and there are often interesting notes about the plant name, history and serious pests.

Most of the plants are illustrated with beautiful photographs which can be used to help identfiy the species in your yard or if you plan a future landscape. There are indices of both common names and scientific names, which make it easy to find a specific plant. Overall, I find this book an excellent resource for the budding horticulturist, professionals and those who are just starting to garden.

It is not too early to think about a holiday gift for yourself or the gardener in your life. �Landscape Plants for South Florida� is available for sale, and some of the plant pages are online for your use. All proceeds of the book support the environmental horticulture department at PBCC. For more information or to purchase the book, ...visit http://www.plantbook.org/index.html.

Carol Cloud Bailey is a landscape counselor and horticulturist. She can be reached at YardDocCarol@aol.com.

Review online at http://www.tcpalm.com/news/2009/nov/05/book-about-local-plants-landscapes-now-available/.