River Plants The Macrophytic Vegetation of Watercourses

About this book

Rivers provide a fascinating and complex environment for plants and this book gives a full-length account of their vegetation. It offers a coherent account of river plants in relation to their environment and to the components of that ecosystem. The ecology is analysed and the ways in which the plants and their community are altered by man's activities are discussed.

The early chapters deal with the physical factors that effect the distribution of plant communities and individual species in rivers, streams and other watercourses. The ecology of the plants and their distribution are then considered in relation to the geology and other features of the river in which they grow. Then the importance of vegetation in rivers, the hazard river plants may present with respect to flooding and water flow, and the ways in which these can be controlled are examined. A final chapter is devoted to pollution in rivers and its effect on the plant communities.

This book is for everyone interested in rivers. Naturalists, botanists, plant ecologists, students of liminology and hydrobiology, zoologists, planners and managers of water resources. Although it looks at British rivers, much of the information is applicable to Western Europe and North America. To help the reader it is profusely illustrated with excellent line drawings, and the use of symbols to identify species types.

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