Walter Kingsley Taylor

Since moving back to Florida years ago, I've been on the lookout for a great wildflower guide. I spent years in Washington State studying the local flora and fauna there, and ethnobotany and herbology and aromatherapy, and I was interested in expanding my knowledge to the native flora of South Florida. I found a couple of books of interest, but nothing that quite fit the bill. Then I came across this book.

This book is a beauty! First there is the cover and binding. Thick, glossy, high-quality. Very impressive. The inside book cover has those handy flaps that are great for helping you save your place in the book. The book is paperback, but the cover is made from high-quality stiff paper that is going to hold up to field work and minor moisture contact.

The book is chock full of information, maps and diagrams. The state of Florida is divided up into four areas: Panhandle, North Florida, Central Florida and South Florida. It breaks down how to identify flowers by flower structure, flowering times, and distribution.

And although this is a wildflower book, it also describes Florida forests: Slope Forest, Upland Hardwood Forests, Mesic Hammocks, Uploand Mixed Woodlands, Sandhills and Upland Pines, Scrubs, Pine Flatwoods, Dry Prairies, Coastal Uplands, Shell Mounds, Pine Rocklands (Subtropical Pine Forests), Rockland Hammocks (Tropical Hardwood Hammocks), and Ruderal Areas (Disturbed Areas). And it describes Florida Wetlands in detail.

That's the first 78 pages. Then there are 400 pages of colorful wildflowers, along with trees, shrubs, and palmettos, all organized by forest or wetland area in which it may be found. Each entry includes a full color photo, scientific name, whether or not the plant is native, a description, flowering time, habitat, range, synonym, and any other comments. 752 plants are listed in this book, each one with a beautiful photo and description.

At the end of the book is a list of Places to Visit. This is divided up by habitat per county, and lists lots of national parks, state parks and wildlife refuges where you can go seek out wildflowers yourself.

My final word: Fabulous, fabulous, fabulous!… (mais)

This is a simple book with a lot of information. For the first time in more than a decade, a single botanist has gathered photographs and detailed all the different species of wildflowers in the state of Florida. University of Central Florida biology professor Walter Kingsley Taylor offers, in his Florida Wildflowers, a useful guide to the Sunshine State’s flowering, native beauty.

The first 75 pages of this book are devoted to detailing what kind of environments are contained in Florida. He explains the differences between the many types of forests as well as a discussion on the different kinds of swamps and marshes. This is important because certain wildflowers are only found in certain domains. The rest of book then comprises plate after plate of plant images, showing each specimen in its natural environment. The reader should easily be able to tell their partridgeberry from their palafoxes, their lopseed from their laurelcherry, and their sandweed from their snoutbeans (as a side note, the names of these plants are just as fascinating as the images).

Professor Taylor’s book is as concise as one can be when describing the myriad plant species native to a state. It is organized a pretty helpful way: plants are grouped in the area on might find them in the state, so that the casual enthusiast might not only be able to identify what’s in front of them but also easily note all the other plants in the area as well. This makes the book useful for both the amateur as well as the professional (although one might gather that the professional wouldn’t need a book at all). I can’t say that this book is entertaining or linguistically inventive, but it gets the job done. A colorful and educational book.… (mais)