Guide to Flowering Plant Families

This is the last word in botanical family id. But the vocabulary is very dense, which makes Plant Identification Terminology: An Illustrated Glossary an essential adjunct to it.

I got this book because I needed to learn about plants and I needed a no nonsense, basic introduction to the plant families of the world--not just trees, not just herbs, and not just information from one part of the world. This book is all that and more. The descriptions of each family use botanical terminology, there are clear line drawings of the taxonomically informative characters, and economically important species are listed in each family. Because I am not an expert on plants, I can't comment on the accuracy of the information, but I can say that this book has been a great resource for me, as a novice botanist. My only complaint (and this is a minor one, because this is not supposed to be a field guide) is that I am unfamiliar with many of the families and color photos would really help me to learn to recognize the plants in nature. I highly recommend this book.

This book is awesome for finding taxonomic ranks, especially that above family status. I work with plant ID's and really use this book to help with finding the obscure ones.

Once again Wendy Zomlefer has provided us with a beautiful, yet very functional, work of art. This book is an excelent reference for both the general public and the seasoned botanist.