Before one even opens either volume of these two volumes, one’s eyes are caught on the front cover by the words ‘Miombo woodland’ from the title of the book, displayed on the upper part with a beautiful landscape, and by flower pictures on the lower part. The back cover is filled with photographs of representative flowers and fruits.
The field guide has two parts in a total of 1020 pages, covering 43 families, 611 genera and 1634 species. Part 1 (pages 1–446) includes a foreword by Noah Zimba, Secretary General, Forestry Institute of Zambia; an introduction to Miombo woodlands by Paul Smith, Secretary General of Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI); and information about the Mutinondo Wilderness and deforestation in Zambia by Lari Merrett. This is followed by a beautiful photographic key showing distinctive growth forms and or characteristics of families and a flower key representing various genera in various families. The section of the volume dealing with the ferns and monocots covers 16 fern families (Ophioglossaceae to Woodsiaceae), two gymnosperm families (Zamiaceae and Podocarpaceae) and three basal angiosperm families (Podostemaceae, Piperaceae and Nymphaeaceae), followed by monocots (from Araceae through Orchidaceae, Asparagaceae and Cyperaceae to Poaceae). Part 2 (pages 447–1020) is entirely devoted to dicots, starting with basal angiosperms, Aristolochiaceae and Annonaceae, followed by dicots proper, from Rhizophoraceae (no. 50) to Apiaceae (no. 143). The dicots include families with diverse genera, such as Fabaceae and Asteraceae.
In both parts 1 and 2 there are descriptions of the characteristics of the families and genera and detailed descriptions of each of the species included, together with notes about their ecology and distribution and illustrative photographs (habitat, habit and close-ups). To help understand the descriptions of the taxa, towards the end there is a glossary, a bibliography and indices to both common and scientific names.
This is one of the most illustrated field guides I have seen in recent years from tropical Africa. Author Lari Merrett has dedicated herself to documenting the beautiful resources of the miombo woodland over many years, and author Kaj Vollesen is a Kew taxonomist who has deep knowledge and expertise on the plants of tropical Africa from Ethiopia to Zambia. The book not only provides information that can be used for identification of the plant resources by conservationists, amateur and professional botanists and students visiting miombo woodlands, but will also be very useful in the identification of plants in the rest of tropical Africa, as some of the species are not restricted to the miombo woodlands in Zambia but also occur across the drylands of tropical Africa.
I recommend that this important book should be available in libraries of academic institutions and should reach the hands of individual botanists, conservationists, nature lovers and tourists visiting the area.
