The Botanical Garden

The Botanical Garden

This two-volume set holds the answer to virtually any gardening question. The Botanical Garden is the most comprehensive gardening work of its kind. Bridging the divide between scientific texts and everyday horticultural books, it is lavishly illustrated throughout with photographs that show the plants in exquisite detail.

Trees and Shrubs
This first volume covers over 450 genera of woody plants, beginning with the tree ferns, ginkos and conifers of the Jurassic period. The book explores in detail the earliest flowering plants, such as the bewitching magnolia, the catkin-bearing trees and familiar fruit trees, maples and others, concluding with the distinctive cordyline, palm and bamboo families.

Perennials and Annuals
Volume II deals with herbaceous plants – over 550 genera of annuals, biennials, perennials, bulbs and aquatic plants. DNA studies have proved vital in the study of these plants and science is now providing definite answers where previously classification was imprecise. The book moves through all the flowering plants, starting with the ancient and intriguing mosses and ferns, and ending with distinctive reeds and grasses that are fundamental to modern gardening.