Botany & plant sciences
Showing all 8 results
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Every living thing
£25.00Every living thing
In the 18th century, two men dedicated their lives to the same daunting task: identifying and describing all life on Earth. Their approaches could not have been more different. Carl Linnaeus, a pious Swedish doctor with a huckster’s flair, believed that life belonged in tidy, static categories. Georges-Louis de Buffon, an aristocratic polymath and keeper of France’s royal garden, viewed life as a dynamic, ever-changing swirl of complexities. Both began believing their work to be difficult, but not impossible – how could the planet possibly hold more than a few thousand species? Stunned by life’s diversity, both fell far short of their goal. But in the process they articulated starkly divergent views on nature, on humanity’s role in shaping the fate of our planet, and on humanity itself. The rivalry between these two unique, driven individuals created reverberations that still echo today.
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How the rose got its thorns
£22.00How the rose got its thorns
Have you ever wondered why the rose has thorns and other flowers don’t; why the daffodil is the colour it is; or why some plants have shiny leaves and others matt? ‘How The Rose Got its Thorns’ reveals the inner workings of our favourite flowers and trees. Designed to help gardeners, both novice and experienced, better understand how plants grow, the book is easy to navigate – it is divided into 50 chapters, each one a story.
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Oaklore
£18.99Oaklore
What connects Robin Hood, the history of ink, fungi, Shakespeare and sorcery? In ‘Oaklore’, Jules Acton, an ambassador for The Woodland Trust, explores the incredibly diverse history of the ‘king of the woods’: from a source of food and shelter to its use in literature as a plot device and muse, its role as an essential ingredient in ink, and in mythology from across the British Isles as a sacred plant and precious resource. Acton’s infectious enthusiasm shines through in chapters that open with excerpts from oak-y poems, as well as tips for connecting with nature – like how to recognize bird songs and help moths and butterflies thrive. Meeting fellow oak-lovers along the way, and trees like Sherwood Forest’s Medusa Oak or the gargantuan Marton Oak in Cheshire, Acton plots an unforgettable journey through the tangled roots of the oak’s story, and that of Britain itself.
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Pathless forest
£25.00Pathless forest
As a child, Chris Thorogood dreamed of seeing Rafflesia – the plant with the world’s largest flowers. He crafted life-size replicas in an abandoned cemetery, carefully bringing them to life with paper and paint. Today he is a botanist at the University of Oxford’s Botanic Garden and has dedicated his life to studying the biology of such extraordinary plants, working alongside botanists and foresters in Southeast Asia to document these huge, mysterious blooms. ‘Pathless Forest’ is the story of his journey to study and protect this remarkable plant – a biological enigma, still little understood, which invades vines as a leafless parasite and steals its food from them.
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Sleeping beauties
£11.99Sleeping beauties
Why do some of nature’s marvels have to wait millions of years for their time in the sun?
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Tree stories
£9.99Tree stories
Trees have played countless roles in human history – by turns hopeful symbols of freedom, pioneering space travellers, keepers of ancient history and accessories to murder. From art to politics, science to crime, these are the stories of the trees that have shaped life on Earth. Neurobiologist and philosopher Stefano Mancuso tells eight stories of trees that have rooted themselves in human history – from the red spruces that were made into Stradivarius’ violins to the wooden ladder that solved ‘The Crime of the Century’. Combining scientific vigour with his inimitable voice, he reveals the amazing ways that the world’s green-print has shaped the course of our lives, issuing a passionate rallying cry for greater care and attention towards the plants that have helped us survive and thrive.
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Wild city
£9.99Wild city
The badgers of Brighton’s most exclusive postcode. The water voles of Glasgow. The Black Country bats who have found a haven in old industrial tunnels. The frogs and newts which thrive in the shadow of Peterborough’s industrial estates. The peregrine falcons nesting on the ledges of tower blocks. The suburban stronghold of Britain’s endangered red squirrels. The mosquitoes found on the London Underground and nowhere else on earth. In ‘Wild City’, Florence Wilkinson takes us on a fascinating journey into why we should engage with our fellow urban species.
£9.99