BookPleasures.com - http://www.bookpleasures.com/websitepublisher
Botany for Gardeners Reviewed By Allan Becker of Bookpleasures.com
http://www.bookpleasures.com/websitepublisher/articles/2566/1/Botany-for-Gardeners-Reviewed-By-Allan-Becker-of-Bookpleasurescom/Page1.html
Allan Becker

Reviewer Allan Becker: Allan has been designing and planting flower gardens, since he was a teenager in the 1960's. Now retired from the soft goods industry, where he held several positions in design, product development, and marketing, he has turned his passion for gardening into a second career, as a garden designer for private clients in Montreal, Canada.


In spring and summer, he provides his assistants, most college students, who transform his designs into flower gardens. In winter, he reviews books on garden-related topics for Bookpleasures.com and writes a Gardening Blog.

Allan earned a B.A. from McGill University, followed by two years of studies in design at Sir George Williams University (now Concordia). He lives in the Montreal suburb of Cote St. Luc, Quebec with his wife and travels regularly to Toronto and Boston to visit his children and grandchildren.




 
By Allan Becker
Published on June 4, 2010
 

Author: Brian Capon
Publisher: Timber Press
ISBN: 978-1-60469-095-8

This book was born in the classroom. It began as a general botany course for non-science majors who were compelled to take a science course. Its success in reaching out to students inspired the transformation of the author’s lecture notes into a book



Author: Brian Capon
Publisher: Timber Press
ISBN: 978-1-60469-095-8

Click Here To Purchase Botany for Gardeners: Third Edition

This book was born in the classroom. It began as a general botany course for non-science majors who were compelled to take a science course. Its success in reaching out to students inspired the transformation of the author’s lecture notes into a book.

Gardeners who are curious about how plants work will be pleased by the crystal-clear presentation. Readers will discover what happens inside a seed after it is planted, how plants use each other –and animals- to survive, how they reproduce and how they transform nutrients into growth.

The publication is divided into five easy-to read sections. The first deals with plant growth, cells, and roots. The second section is about plant organization- the inner components of stems, roots, and leaves. Third is a section on how plants adapt to their environment in order to fulfill the basic needs of survival and propagation. The fourth section discusses the influence of light, gravity, temperature, water and nutrients and the effect that they have on growth and development. Finally, the fifth section deals with reproduction and heredity.

Here are some outstanding features in this publication: Look for clear photos comparing a fibrous root system with a taproot and comparative drawings explaining the differences between a runner, a rhizome, and a sucker. There are also dazzling plant images taken with a scanning electron microscope, a discussion of genetic engineering, and awesome diagrams showing the sequence of photosynthesis: how water, air, and light produce sugars in a plant, which when combined with soil minerals produce fats, protein, and vitamins. This reviewer was delighted to find graphic illustrations that visualize the various descriptions of inflorescence. I discovered the difference between a spike, a raceme, a panicle, an umbel, and a composite head. Try treading a flower catalogue without a basic knowledge of these concepts.

The author, a native of Cheshire England, was educated in England, Canada, and the United States, receiving a Master of Science and Ph.D. degrees at the University of Chicago. For thirty years, he was Professor of Botany at California State University, Los Angeles, where he taught courses ranging from undergraduate general botany to advanced subjects for graduate students.

Those who feel the need to know more about the science behind gardening will find great satisfaction in reading this publication. While the information presented is comprehensive, it is, in the end, a reader-friendly book.

 Click Here To Purchase Botany for Gardeners: Third Edition