The Encyclopeadia of New Zealand Native Plants by Yvonne Cave & Valda Paddison (Godwit, 1999, 2nd Edition 2002).
This book is a deserving winner of the Montana Book Awards (2000) and the Spectrum Print Book Design Awards (2000).
New Zealand has a wonderful, very special native flora. Our native kowhai (Sophora ssp.) and pohutukawa (Metrosideros excelsus) are unsurpassed as flowering trees. You will find these and many other plants in this wonderful book. There is something, in fact, for every garden.
Increasingly aware of the value of New Zealand's indigenous plants, gardeners are more interested than ever in using natives. This book is very timely as it provides not only a comprehensive listing of New Zealand plants and their cultivars, but it has sections on how and where to use them.
The book is divided into three main sections. The introductory section has some luscious photographs which demonstrate how to use native plants in your garden schemes and the informative text backs these up. There are great 'boxes' with listings to help select plants suitable for different situations, climates and gardens.
The core of the book has photographs of individual plants- more than enough to tempt you to rush out to the plant nursery to invest! The close-ups illustrate flowers and foliage and there are plenty of photos of mature specimens, enabling the reader to gain an idea of the eventual size and impact of each plant.
The final section has a detailed description of each plant, its soil and climate requirements and, once again, some hints on how to best use it in the garden.
The index lists plants by botanical and common name, helping out those who find it difficult to keep up with the recent re-classification of our native flora.
