Botany Science

When Dr. David Hosack tilled the country's first botanical garden in the Manhattan soil more than 200 years ago, he didn't just dramatically alter the New York landscape; he left a monumental legacy of advocacy for public health and wide-ranging support for the sciences. In melodic prose, historian Victoria Johnson eloquently chronicles Hosack's tireless career to reveal the breadth of his impact. The result is a lush portrait of the man who gave voice to a new, deeply American understanding of the powers and perils of nature.

In this intoxicating concoction of history, travelogue, and memoir, one of the perfume industry’s leading scouts of natural ingredients tells the story of the precious ingredients needed to make our favorite fragrances.

Drawing from her experiences as an Indigenous scientist, botanist Robin Wall Kimmerer demonstrated how all living things—from strawberries and witch hazel to water lilies and lichen—provide us with gifts and lessons every day in her bestselling book Braiding Sweetgrass. Adapted for young adults by Monique Gray Smith, this new edition reinforces how wider ecological understanding stems from listening to the earth's oldest teachers: the plants around us.

In the summer of 1941, German troops surrounded the Russian city of Leningrad—now St. Petersburg—and began the longest blockade in recorded history, one that would ultimately claim the lives of nearly three-quarters of a million people. At the center of the besieged city stood a converted palace that housed the world’s largest collection of seeds—more than 250,000 samples hand-collected over two decades from all over the globe by world-famous explorer, geneticist, and dissident Nikolai Vavilov, who had recently been disappeared by the Soviet government.

In this accessible, absorbing overview, Mancuso considers how plants convince animals to transport them around the world, and how some plants need particular animals to spread; how they have been able to grow in places so inaccessible and inhospitable as to remain isolated; how they resisted the atomic bomb and the Chernobyl disaster; how they are able to bring life to sterile islands; how they can travel through the ages, as they sail around the world.

The Forgotten Botanistis a timeless tale about a woman who discovered who she was by leaving everything behind. Her inspiring story is one of resilience, determination, and courage—and is as relevant to our nation today as it was in her own time.

Anthony Trollope is most famous for his portrait of the professional and landed classes of Victorian England, especially in his Palliser and Barsetshire novels. But he was also the author of one of the most fascinating autobiographies of the nineteenth century. Trollope was born in 1815, the product of a formidable mother and a tragically unsuccessful father who was socially ambitious for his sons. He was the victim of vicious bullying at Harrow and Winchester. But he had inherited his mother's determination, and managed later to carve out a successful career in the General Post Office while devoting every spare moment to writing. How he paid his groom to wake him every morning at 5:30 a.m. and disciplined himself to write 250 words every fifteen minutes has become part of literary legend. His efforts resulted in over sixty books, a sizable fortune, and fame, and his autobiography. Trollope looks back on his life with satisfaction. Perhaps as interesting as the facts he reveals and the opinions he records about Dickens and George Eliot, politics and the civil service are the judgments he passes on his own character.

With a new introduction exclusively in audio, read by Anna Pavord. The Tulip is not a gardening book. It is the story of a flower that has made men mad. Greed, desire, anguish and devotion have all played their parts in the development of the tulip into the worldwide phenomenon it is today. No other flower has ever carried so much cultural baggage; it charts political upheavals, illuminates social behaviour, mirrors economic booms and busts and plots the ebb and flow of religious persecution.

Explore the strange and remarkable stories of poisonous and even deadly plants. Science, history, and true crime converge in an informative and exciting look at Mother Nature's ghoulish garden. From a hallucinogenic fungus linked to the Salem Witch Trials to the weed that killed Abraham Lincoln's mother, learn how certain plants evolved toxicity to avoid being consumed by predators and became the predator on their own.

A heady blend of international intrigue, social theory, botanical lore, and ecological study, The Cactus Hunters offers complex insight into species extinction, conservation, and more-than-human care.

We all need help centering ourselves to serve ourselves and our world. In this small, beautiful book, the Kogi—a remote and ancient tribe in the mountains of Colombia—offer their learnings. They pose nine provocative questions to help people around the planet to spiritual peace.

In The Nation of Plants, the most important, widespread, and powerful nation on Earth finally gets to speak. Like attentive parents, plants, after making it possible for us to live, have come to our aid once again, giving us their rules: the first Universal Declaration of Rights of Living Beings written by the plants. A short charter based on the general principles that regulate the common life of plants, it establishes norms applicable to all living beings.

Have you ever wondered why the leaves of the Swiss cheese plant have holes? How aloe vera came to be harnessed as a medicinal powerhouse? Or why—despite your best efforts—you can’t keep your Venus flytrap alive? You are not alone: houseplant expert Jane Perrone has asked herself those very questions, and in Legends of the Leaf she digs deep beneath the surface to reveal the answers.

Wir stellen uns Bäume als eine passive Spezies vor, die an einen Ort gebunden ist, dabei gestalten sie ihre Umwelt aktiv. Sie zerkleinern Felsen, verbreitern die Küsten, vergiften gezielt Tiere, kontrollieren Wasserkreisläufe und lösen sogar Waldbrände aus. Seit prähistorischen Zeiten beeinflussen Bäume so ganze Ökosysteme, das Klima und schließlich auch uns Menschen maßgeblich. Die britische Biochemikerin und Journalistin Harriet Rix nimmt uns mit auf eine atemberaubende Weltreise zu Wäldern in Kalifornien, Syrien, Brasilien, im Himalaya, oder auf La Gomera.

The Hidden Histories of Houseplants explores twenty of the world's most common houseplants. This book isn't just a dry exploration of historical cultivation; the narrative explores the plants' places in social history, science and culture, showcasing the most fascinating elements of each plant's story, be it the exploration as to why Monstera deliciosa have holes in their leaves, whether houseplants have the ability to count, or why Calathea leaves open during the day and close up at night.

Have you ever wondered how plants know when to grow, when to bloom, or even when to warn their neighbors of danger? While we often think of plants as still and silent, they are actually incredibly active, intelligent, and deeply connected to one another. This book is your guide to discovering the hidden world of plant communication—one that has been unfolding in the soil beneath our feet for millions of years. From the smallest root to the tallest tree, plants are part of a vast, invisible network that allows them to share resources, send warnings, and even support one another in times of...

Are humans unwitting partners in evolution with psychedelic plants? Darwin’s Pharmacy shows they are by weaving the evolutionary theory of sexual selection and the study of rhetoric together with the science and literature of psychedelic drugs. Long suppressed as components of the human tool kit, psychedelic plants can be usefully modeled as “eloquence adjuncts” that intensify a crucial component of sexual selection in humans: discourse.

Carlos Magdalena is not your average horticulturist. He's a man on a mission to save the world's most endangered plants. First captivated by the flora of his native Spain, he has traveled to the remotest parts of the globe in search of exotic species. Renowned for his pioneering work, he has committed his life to protecting plants from man-made ecological destruction and thieves hunting for wealthy collectors.

You don’t need to be a professional landscaper to be able to grow your own thriving garden, and you definitely don’t need four acres of land to add a touch of nature to your home. Whether you’re a lifelong gardener looking for inspiration, or you’re just someone who loves being surrounded by nature, this comprehensive guide will give you everything you need to know about growing plants in small spaces with raised beds, containers, and vertical structures, so you can finally start on a gardening journey that will last a lifetime.

Jailed as a scapegoat for Stalin's famines, Vavilov had traveled over five continents, collected hundreds of thousands of seeds in an effort to outline the ancient centers of agricultural diversity. Gary Paul Nabhan weaves together Vavilov's story with his own expeditions to Earth's richest agricultural landscapes and the cultures that tend them.