Wild Orchids of Florida: With References to the Gulf and Atlantic Coastal Plain

Rating:
Summary: Finally, a guide to Florida orchids
Review: I had been hoping for a Florida orchid book for a long time to help me understand and identify native orchids. This book goes beyond my expectations. It is wonderfully thorough, with each species covered on two full pages. One page describes the distribution, identifying characteristics, habitat, flowering period, and has a Florida range map and plant illustration. The facing page has several photographs of the plant, showing growing habit, flower close-up, and different color forms. I particularly appreciate the range maps identifying all the Florida counties where the plant has been found. I was able to easily go through the book and make a list of all the species found in my area. The photos are very good and the variety of scales really helps. Reading this guide, it seems like there are orchids all around just waiting for the trained eye to notice them. A must have for your field guide collection.

Rating:
Summary: Orchids of Florida
Review: The book is well done and put together. The only issues I noted are that the author does not give photogrpahic credit to several contributors. Least of which is Carlyle Luer. The author has used several copied photos right from Dr. Luers "Native Orchids of Florida" without permission or proper credit.

Some of the taxonomic changes and listing are not as accurate as they could be, but the overall work is complete and covers all known species to occur in Florida. One helpful note, future books should follow the Luer style for various stories and all photos should have dates taken and county listings.