The Secrets of Great Botanists And What They Teach Us About Gardening

About this book

Botanists have been the trailblazers in discovering how plants work to benefit our species, collecting many of the plant species we find in our gardens today from all around the world. This informative and beautiful guide presents the stories and reveals the secrets of 35 of these botanists, plant collectors and gardening pioneers of the past and present.

This includes Joseph Banks, Asa Gray and Marianne North, highlighting the qualities that brought them success. Every botanist included in The Secrets of Great Botanists was, or is, passionate about their particular specialty. Whether they were searching for plants in wild places, prescribing herbal medicines or forming new structures of plant classification, they were driven by an insatiable desire to learn and discover, so that we, as humans, might benefit from improved crops, medicines or gardens.

Through the vibrancy of botanical photographs and beautifully illustrated period botanical watercolours, this book aims to teach readers about the observations, ideas, secrets and discoveries of these ground-breaking botanists. Their influence on gardening and the wider world will provide inspiration and practical guidance for budding gardeners of all levels and inspire readers to try these plants and tips at home.

Contents

Introduction

- Pedanius Dioscorides c. ad 40-90
- Leonhart Fuchs 1501-1566
- William Turner c. 1508-1568
- John Ray 1627-1705
- Mary Somerset 1630-1715
- Henry Compton 1632-1713
- William Dampier 1651-1715
- John Bartram 1699-1777
- Carl Linnaeus 1707-1778
- Jeanne Baret 1740-1807
- Joseph Banks 1743-1820
- James Edward Smith 1759-1828
- Philipp von Siebold 1796-1866
- John Lindley 1799-1865
- Anna Atkins 1799-1871
- Georgiana Molloy 1805-1843
- Asa Gray 1810-1888
- William Colenso 1811-1899
- Joseph Dalton Hooker 1817-1911
- Gregor Mendel 1822-1884
- Marianne North 1830-1890
- Luther Burbank 1849-1926
- Henry Nicholas Ridley 1855-1956
- Charlotte Wheeler-Cuffe 1867-1967
- George Forrest 1873-1932
- Ernest Wilson 1876-1930
- Francis Kingdon-Ward 1885-1958
- Nikolai Vavilov 1887-1943
- Carl Rudolf Florin 1894-1965
- E. K. Janaki Ammal 1897-1984
- William Stearn 1911- 2001
- Richard Evans Schultes 1915-2001
- Mikinori Ogisu Born 1951
- Bleddyn & Sue Wynn-Jones Born 1948 (Bleddyn) and 1952 (Sue)
- Patrick Blanc Born 1953

Bibliography
Index
Credits

Customer Reviews

Biography

Matthew Biggs trained at The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, has presented numerous television programmes, notably Channel 4's Garden Club, and is a regular panellist on BBC Radio 4's Gardeners' Question Time. He has written several books, including the recently revised Complete Book of Vegetables and the Eden Project's Gardening at Eden and how to do it at home. Matthew contributes to several magazines, including the RHS's The Garden, BBC Gardeners' World, and Gardens Illustrated. He lectures at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Oxford University Botanic Gardens, and the Cookery School of Michelin-starred chief Jean-Christophe Novelli, and is course Director of the Plants and Plantsmanship course at the English Gardening School.