orchid

A wonderful introduction to 130 native orchids of the Margaret River and southwest capes region of Western Australia. Full of clear colour photographs, this book will aid in identifying orchids found not only in this region, but also the International Biodiversity Hotspot. Each species is illustrated by at least one photograph and details are provided on appearance, habitat, distribution and flowering times.

Over 150 orchid species were found while collecting orchid specimens from the Hunter Region for the herbarium at the Botanic Gardens Trust, Sydney. This book is a pictorial guide to those orchids, with information about identifying features and flowering times.
Elisabeth Burton has been a life-long naturalist; a botanist, bushwalker, photographer and bush regenerator. Over the last ten years her interest in botany has been focused on Australian native orchids.

For many botanists, Darwin’s true legacy starts with the 1862 publication of On the Various Contrivances by Which British and Foreign Orchids Are Fertilised by Insects and on the Good Effects of lntercrossing, or Fertilisation of Orchids. This slim but detailed book with the improbably long title was the first in a series of plant studies by Darwin that continues to serve as a global exemplar in the field of evolutionary botany. In this book, an international group of orchid biologists unites to celebrate and explore this legacy. Darwin’s Orchids investigates flowers from Darwin’s home in England, through the southern hemisphere, and on to North America and China as it seeks to address a set of questions first put forward by Darwin himself such as what pollinates this particular type of orchid and how this orchid’s lineage changed over time.
Diverse in their colors, forms, aromas, and pollination schemes, orchids have long been considered ideal models for the study of plant evolution and conservation. Looking to the past, present, and future of botany, Darwin’s Orchids will be a vital addition to this tradition.

A fantastic tale of adventure in search of the fabled ‘blue orchid’. The Orchid Seekers in Borneo is a collaboration between an a writer, Ashmore Rusan, and an explorer, Frederick Boyle, who had indeed traveled to countries where orchids grow and was himself a successful grower of these spectacular blooms. First published in 1893, The Orchid Seekers in Borneo captures life in Sarawak under the rule of the Brooke family. Events that took place during that time and details of the distinctiveness of the native people and their lifestyle in Sarawak are interwoven into an elaborate journey by a German orchid collector and his entourage into the wilds of Borneo.

An attempt by the author to inject authenticity to the German ancestry of the main character through an exaggerated accent is almost comical as is the imperious manner of the English characters accompanying Mr Hertz on his quest. That aside, The Orchid Seekers in Borneo does give an interesting account of almost all the important aspects of native life at that time, the orchids and other plants that held the western world in awe and an insight into the traditions of the native people of Sarawak that both terrified and fascinated the developed world. A weaving tale that takes readers on the whole gamut of experience, adventure, history and culture.