Trees of Pennsylvania and the Northeast

Rating:
Summary: Head for the Vast PA Forests
Review: Here's another winner from Charles Fergus on the natural side of Pennsylvania. Many people are unaware of the vast forests of Pennsylvania, and the surprisingly varied trees therein. Here Fergus, who is quite a readable writer, describes just about every tree to be found in Pennsylvania, both naturally or in some cases ornamental. Descriptions of the bark, leaves, fruits/nuts, ranges, and life spans of most of the trees are described in detail. A refreshing aspect of this book is that Fergus has made real efforts to see specimens of many of these trees himself, sometimes extremely remote and rare specimens. One interesting chapter covers trees that are not native to PA but were introduced either purposefully or accidentally, with either good or bad consequences for the ecosystem. I was not aware that weeping willows and apple trees are not native to Pennsylvania. The only problem with this book is a general shortage of illustrations, meaning you'll have to rely on text descriptions of leaf shape or bark texture alone, making it hard to prospect for noteworthy trees yourself. But this is probably just a production constraint, and pictures can be found elsewhere without too much trouble.

Rating:
Summary: Not a book for beginning ID
Review: If you have a background in forestry and already know your trees then this book is fine for such things as additional research. If you are looking for a book to help you with tree identification in the field look elsewhere. There are very few pictures to help the beginner and flipping through to read the descriptions to figure it out gets annoying.