CURRENT ISSUE

SUBSCRIBE

CONTACT US

ADVERTISING

SEARCH

BACK ISSUES

CONTRIBUTORS'
GUIDELINES

THIS WEEK IN
CALIFORNIA WILD

Reviews

An Evergreen Read

Conifers of California, by Ronald M. Lanner. Cachuma Press, Los Olivos, CA, 1999, 274 pp., $36.95 cloth, $24.95 paper.

California is the best place in the world to find conifers. Home to 52 native species, including 14 endemics, California boasts a higher diversity of conifers than any comparably sized region on Earth. So rich is this diversity that it’s possible to view 16 species in a single square mile centered on Russian Peak in the Klamath Mountains.

Remarkably, no book has focused on this unique flora since J. Smeaton Chase’s 1911 Cone-Bearing Trees of the California Mountains. But with a wealth of new natural history information and substantial taxonomic changes to incorporate, forest biologist Ronald Lanner has given California conifers their first full and magnificently illustrated modern treatment.

As a professional naturalist whose work depends on high-quality field guides, my hat goes off to Cachuma Press. For Conifers of California, like their much acclaimed Oaks of California, is absolutely jam-packed with stunning photographs. This is one of the most exciting natural history books I have seen in years—equally informative and visually pleasing.

Lanner captures the character of each species with richly descriptive text. Ranging from the “neatly layered tiers of horizontal branches” on western white pine to the “dark-foliaged, pendulous branches” of Brewer spruce, his descriptions bring these trees alive. One of the best features of this book is the practicality of its format; it teaches how to identify each species from a distance, while standing beneath it, or with a branch or cone in hand.

Supplementing the photos and text are a series of never-before-published watercolors by Finnish emigrant Eugene O. Murman, who set out in 1940 to paint California’s flora, and whose work has been sadly neglected. California artist Susan Bazell contributed a few original paintings as well.

Unlike simple field guides, Conifers of California describes each species’ larger ecological context. We learn that redwoods occur at elevations between 100 and 2,500 feet, often in association with Douglas-fir, western hemlock, and tanoak. Steller’s jays, winter wrens, and marbled murrelets nest on the redwood’s branches, while the ground below will be home to banana slugs, Coast Range newts, and shrews.

The species accounts include information on the roles that fire, snow, and other natural processes play for different conifers. They also describe human uses of the trees and the origin of each tree species’ name. These accounts are well written, though I’m disappointed that Lanner’s prose is not as strong here as in his 1983 Trees of the Great Basin, one of my all-time favorite books.

He also neglects to introduce readers to general conifer morphology, physiology, and life history; instead he segues from two short sidebars on “The Names of Trees” and “Cones” right into the first species account. Some of the information presented later in the book is a little difficult to understand without this introduction.

Even more surprising, Lanner presents a brief and somewhat confusing account of a tree he himself described in 1974, the enigmatic Sierra Juarez pinyon. This will be many readers’ first exposure to the tree and its hybrid counterpart, the Parry pinyon, and I reread it several times but still wanted more details.

On the other hand, Lanner does an excellent job of delineating the taxonomic muddle of cypresses that has some botanists at odds. He defines the ten species that fall into observable natural populations, but in each account he refers to the alternate strategies used by The Jepson Manual and Flora of North America.

Conifers of California belongs in every naturalist’s library. It is a text to which I will refer repeatedly and regularly. And, with this book in hand, I’ll be embarking on some new conifer-seeking adventures.

—David Lukas

Recommended reading from the Editors' Desks

The Monterey Bay Shoreline Guide, by Jerry Emory, with photographs by Frank Balthis. The University of California Press, Berkeley, CA, 1999, 320 pp., $35.00 cloth, $16.95 paper.

From the hills above Santa Cruz, the perfect crescent of Monterey Bay exerts a powerful pull on onlookers to descend from the redwoods and come down to the ocean’s edge. Anyone who decides to make a closer inspection is well advised to have Jerry Emory along, at least in print, as a guide. Part of a series of books on marine conservation published jointly with the Monterey Bay Aquarium, Emory’s latest effort follows a format similar to his handy San Francisco Bay Shoreline Guide, but the Monterey volume is even more substantial. The 200-plus color and black-and-white photographs by Frank Balthis, from a rainbow rising over the mouth of Elkhorn Slough to coyote tracks crossing windswept sand, capture the region’s natural allure. This book might satisfy armchair travelers, though it surely whets the appetite for a real trip up or down Highway One, assisted by the ample two-page maps scattered throughout.

Coverage spans the arc of Monterey Bay from Año Nuevo State Reserve south to Big Sur. Each chapter highlights the natural and recreational attractions along that portion of the coast, and Emory provides concise natural history highlights along the way. Frequent “Sanctuary Notes” discuss the offshore denizens of Monterey Bay, from squid to shearwaters, and broader topics such as animal migration, while other sidebars profile prominent historical periods or people.

Rather than state explicitly where to go and what to do, The Monterey Bay Shoreline Guide displays a range of scenic options, offers friendly guidance about what a curious and keen-eyed observer might experience, and then leaves it to readers to head out and make their own discoveries along the centerpiece of California’s incomparable coast.

A Voyage to California, the Sandwich Islands, and Around the World in the Years 1826-1829, by Auguste Duhaut-Cilly, translated by August Fruge and Neal Harlow. The University of California Press, Berkeley, CA, 1999, 317 pp., $29.95 cloth.

Written 170 years ago, but as fresh as if it were yesterday, this history is a gem. It is reminiscent of Richard Dana’s Two Years Before the Mast but, in many ways, far more fascinating. Auguste Duhaut-Cilly, as captain of his ship, was master of his travels during his two years on the California coast where he met most of the major players. As a neutral Frenchman, he was privy to the confidences of the English, Americans, Spanish, Mexicans, and Californians. He was in California at a critical time (1827 through 1828) when the recently independent Mexico decreed that Spanish citizens must return to Europe, and was able to observe the distress that ensued.

Duhaut-Cilly also offers insightful and sympathetic commentary on the status of the Indians, environmental destruction, and the relationships between missions, military, and an emerging civilian population. The book is also something of a mystery as the captain gradually discovers that his double-crossing commercial officer is investing in the success of a rival enterprise. There was an earlier English language version of this volume, published in 1929, but the literal translation did the book no favors. In this edition, the elegant translation does justice to the original.

Ecology: A Pocket Guide, by Ernest Callenbach, The University of California Press, Berkeley, CA, 1998, 176 pp., $9.95 paper.

This small, easy-to-use book of ecological insight is useful at several levels. It is a good book to have on hand when nature-walking with a wide-eyed child or a grandchild with never-ending questions that begin with the words, "Why does...?" or "How come...?" It will also help to interpret confusing quotes or news and magazine articles addressing the ecology or land management issue du jour. Who is the confused one: you, or the author, or the person being quoted? In three pages, for example, Callenbach provides a conceptual framework that sorts out the various definitions of the word "biodiversity," so often bandied about by opposing sides in environmental arguments. In non-technical language, the author explains 60 basic ecological terms. Arranged alphabetically, the book is amply cross-referenced and indexed. The text is reader-friendly and rewarding to roam at random. In the end, the author hopes you will discover the following "laws" of ecology:

“All things are interconnected.
Everything goes someplace.
There is no such thing as a free lunch.
Nature bats last.”

Karl Blossfeldt 1865-1932, edited by Hans Christian Adam. Benedikt Taschen, Köln, Germany, 1999, 360 pp., $40.00 cloth.

Though taken at the beginning of the twentieth century, these photos look astonishingly contemporary and eerily timely a century later. Karl Blossfeldt started his career as a wrought iron craftsman but later shifted to photography, taking magnified photographs of prepared plant specimens. He further enlarged the photographs in the studio and used them as "models" to teach drawing to his design students during an era when nature was the inspiration for Art Nouveau and the Craftsmen. The oversized volume is composed of large, richly textured duotone photographs of plants. The plants are identified by their scientific names, but that’s where the science ends. This is not an herbarium. The specimens are denuded of leaves, stripped of petals, meticulously arranged, and greatly enlarged to reveal their fantastic forms. Nevertheless, this book bridges a boundary between science and art and makes accessible the profound forms and endless diversity of plants that impassion both artists and scientists. "Art does not reproduce the visible, but illuminates, renders visible," said artist Paul Klee, who is quoted in the book. If there is nothing new under the sun, Blossfeldt’s photographs continue to illuminate and render visible those ancient plants that grow under that timeless sun in a way that never looked so new.

Fall 1999

Vol. 52:4