New Books on South African Proteas and Fynbos
- Subject: New Books on South African Proteas and Fynbos
- From: d* f*
- Date: Thu, 13 Jun 2002 15:33:40 -0700 (PDT)
Just thought I would write about two excellent books I
recently purchased at Strybing Arboretum on South
African Flora. I am trying to get a grip on what I
will be visiting on an August botanical tour to the
Western Cape, and stumbled upon these 2 books.
The book on Proteas, by Tony Rebelo, ISBN 1 874950 40
7, is excellent for the coverage of habitats, photos,
and distribution maps, and is an introduction for me
to genera I had never seen before; such as Aulax,
Saptalla, Diastella, Orothamnus, as well as some I
knew of, but are uncommon here, such as Mimetes and
Serruria. I expect that this will be most useful as a
guide while exploring the different fynbos habitats of
the Cape.
The second book is even more interesting as a general
introduction to the fynbos plant communities. The
photos and text are also superb, and this book also
has a companion book on the Namaqualand flora. The
book is by Richard Cowling and Dave Richardson, titled
Fynbos, South Africa's Unique Floral Kingdom, ISBN 1
874950 10 5. I don't know if we have anything as good
covering the chaparral plant communities of
California, and the insights on fire ecology and
introduced exotics and their impacts on hydrology make
interesting reading. It leaves me wondering if the
analogy can also be made that non-native trees planted
in our local California watersheds are actually
decreasing the watershed storage potential? I have
only occasionally heard this stated for Eucalyptus,
but not for things like Monterey Pines/Cypress/Coast
Redwoods. I suspect that our locally prevalent fog
and fog drip make the situation slightly different
here compared to The Western Cape?
For those interested specifically in the mediterranean
and African subtropical/montane savanna flora of South
Africa, these are two great books.
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