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An illustrated hourly guide that spotlights twenty-four flowers as they attract pollinators, resist predators, and survive on our changing planet.
Is it 4 AM or chicory o'clock? In this short book, botanist and award-winning author Sandra Knapp walks us through a day in a global garden. Each chapter of Flower Day introduces a single flower during a single hour, highlighting twenty-four different species from around the world.
Beginning at midnight in the Americas, we spot the long tubular flowers of the moonflower, Ipomoea alba; they attract a frenzy of hawk moths before the dawn arrives and the flowers wither and collapse. As day breaks, dandelions and chicory open their heads – actually made up of many individual flowers tightly packed together – and flies and bees visit to get the energy they need to lay eggs and raise their young. Later, at eight o'clock in the morning, the sun rises over the watery Amazon basin, and we meet the giant waterlily, slowly turning from white to pink and purple. Trapped inside are the beetles who feasted on the flowers during the night. That evening, at seven o'clock, we travel to the Caribbean to smell night-blooming jessamine's powerful – some may say nauseating – sweet scent. But this member of the nightshade family isn't just a thing of beauty – it has a reputation as both a poison and invasive species, crowding out endangered native trees.
For each hour in our flower day, celebrated artist Katie Scott has depicted these scenes with gorgeous pen-and-ink illustrations. Working closely together to narrate and illustrate these unique moments in time, Knapp and Scott have created an engaging read that is a perfect way to spend an hour or two – and a true gift for amateur botanists, gardeners, and anyone who wants to stop and appreciate the flowers.
Preface
Midnight Moonflower (The Americas)
1 AM Queen of the Night (The Caribbean, Central America, Mexico)
2 AM Angraecum (Madagascar)
3 AM East Coast Banksia (Australia)
4 AM Chicory (Europe, Introduced to North America)
5 AM Dandelion (Worldwide)
6 AM Coyote Tobacco (North America)
7 AM Curly Rock Rose (Africa, Europe)
8 AM Uape Jacana or Giant Waterlily (Amazon Basin, the Guianas)
9 AM Sunflower (North America)
10 AM Sago Palm (Southeast Asia)
11 AM Western Blue Flax or Lewis Flax (North America)
Noon Jack-Go-to-Bed-at-Noon or Meadow Salsify (Europe, Introduced to North America)
1 PM Antarctic Hair Grass (Antarctica, Patagonia)
2 PM Titan Arum or Corpse Flower (Sumatra)
3 PM The Traveler's Tree (Madagascar)
4 PM Four-O'Clock (The Americas)
5 PM Harakeke or New Zealand Flax (Aotearoa-New Zealand)
6 PM California Poppy (North America)
7 PM Night-Blooming Jessamine (The Caribbean)
8 PM White Campion (Eurasia, Introduced to North America)
9 PM Sacred Datura (North America)
10 PM Leafless Ephedra (Europe)
11 PM Giant Saguaro (North America)
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Further Reading
Index
Sandra Knapp is a senior research botanist at the Natural History Museum in London and Fellow of the Royal Society. She served as president of the Linnean Society from 2018 to 2022. She is the author of several books, including Extraordinary Orchids and In the Name of Plants, both also published by the University of Chicago Press.
Katie Scott is a freelance illustrator whose work has appeared in publications including the New York Times and Nature. She has illustrated several books, including Animalium and Botanicum.
"Knapp's beautiful flower essays will inspire every reader to look more closely at the world's botanical wonders. Knapp's descriptions abound with diversity: color, shape, odor, height, size, sex habits, pollinators, fruits, seeds, patterns, longevity, and a wide array of cultural stories. Her chapters range from the enormous sago palm (as big as a Volkswagen Beetle) to the tiny hairgrass in Antarctica, and from our lust for orchids to our love-hate relationship with dandelions. These stories are beautifully written, with extraordinary illustrations, and every reader will come away with a greater admiration for all things floral."
– Meg Lowman, author of The Arbornaut
"All of us are used to walking out into gardens in the evening and seeing the moonflowers opening, with Carolina jessamine and others joining them throughout the night. Buttercups, asters, sunflowers, and fuchsias bloom at specific times, starting near dawn. Together, these plants present a rich panorama – a kind of floral clock that, with its various combinations, informs a careful observer of the time of day, rain or shine. In this beautifully illustrated book, Knapp generously enriches our understanding of the lovely floral views that greet us every hour of the day and night."
– Peter H. Raven, president emeritus, Missouri Botanical Garden
"Flower Day offers a glorious, round-the-clock glimpse into the incredible plant diversity on the planet. This book highlights how and why different plants flower at different times during the day, and Knapp masterfully intertwines the botany, plant biology, history, evolution, and ecology of twenty-four species. Anyone with even a cursory affinity for plants or curiosity about the natural world will appreciate this beautiful book."
– Allison Miller, Donald Danforth Plant Science Center and Saint Louis University
