The Natural History of Pollination (Collins New Naturalist Library, Book 83) - Hardcover

Proctor, Michael; Yeo, Peter; Lack, Andrew

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 000219905X ISBN 13: 9780002199056

Publisher: Collins, 1996

Synopsis

The importance of insects in pollinating flowers is today so well known, it is easy to forget that it was discovered less than 200 years ago. Before that, it was believed that the concern of bees with flowers was simply a matter of collecting honey. The methods by which pollen reaches the female flower, enabling fertilization and seed production to take place, include some of the most varied and fascinating mechanisms in the natural world. This guide describes all the ways pollination is effected - by wind, w even bats - but principally in many wonderful ways by a diversity of insect species.

About this title

About the Author

Michael Proctor is an Honorary Research Fellow (and until his retirement in 1994 was Reader in Plant Ecology) at the Department of Biological Sciences, University of Exeter. With wide interests in ecology and plant biosystematics, his interest in insects and pollination ecology dates from his student days, shared with Peter Yeo at Cambridge. He has published many scientific papers on a variety of ecological topics. He is a Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society.

From the Back Cover

This is a brand new, fully updated edition of the natural history classic first published in 1973 as 'The Pollination of Flowers'.

The importance of insects in pollinating flowers is today so well known that it is easy to forget that it was discovered little more than two centuries ago: before that, it was believed that the concern of bees with flowers was simply a matter of collecting honey.

But the methods by which pollen reaches the female flower, enabling fertilisation and seed production to take place, include some of the most varied and fascinating mechanisms in the natural world. 'The Natural History of Pollination' describes all the ways in which pollination is brought about: by wind, water, birds, bats and even mice and rats; but principally by a great diversity of insects in an amazing range of ways, some simple, some bizarre.

This book is a unique introduction to a complex yet easily accessible subject of great fascination.

REVIEWS OF THE PREVIOUS EDITION

"This is a great book"
NEW SCIENTIST

"… combines scholarship with lucidity, and brings innumerable fascinating details of the subject to the enthusiastic amateur as well as the professional botanist"
THE TIMES EDUCATIONAL SUPPLEMENT

Edition details

• Publisher: Collins
• Publication date: 1996
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 000219905X
• ISBN 13: 9780002199056
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 384