The Liverworts of New Zealand. by K. W. Allison; John ChildReview by: E. W. JonesNew Phytologist, Vol. 77, No. 1 (Jul., 1976), pp. 293-294Published by: Wiley on behalf of the New Phytologist TrustStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2433662 .

Accessed: 17/06/2014 01:54

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

.

Wiley and New Phytologist Trust are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to NewPhytologist.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 185.44.78.156 on Tue, 17 Jun 2014 01:54:16 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Reviews 293

publication, Pacific Plant Areas includes new and valuable maps, and also deals with crypto- grams. Furthermore the work is 'up to date' and is now being supplemented, addenda and corrigenda relevant to the first volumes being collected to be published with the later ones. He might well have added that Index Holmensis, if it is ever finished, is a monument to uncritical accumulation of maps making an inflated encyclopedia of high cost and little value. The Index includes references to county floras and outdated works even when a critical modern map has been produced, so that the increase in size of the Index actually diminishes its value by making it more difficult and time-consuming to find references to the relatively few useful maps listed in it.

The seventy new maps in Pacific Plant Areas are each faced by details of the taxa mapped, references, and mode of dispersal and ecology, if known. Where necessary, a different base map has been used to accommodate records outside the Pacific basin.

As a self-rectifying serial, which is not merely a compendium but is presenting new material, Pacific Plant Areas is a useful work for all those interested in the biology of the Pacific.

D. J. MABBERLEY

The Liverworts of New Zealand. By K. W. ALLISON and JOHN CHILD. 22 X I4 cm (82 x 52

inches). Pp. 300; 32 pages of photographic plates and numerous figures in text. Dunedin: University of Otago Press, I975. Price $I2.50.

New Zealand, further south than most of Australia, and with a higher and more equable precipitation, is one of the chief repositories of the remarkable hepatic flora of the temperate southern hemisphere, rich in species, many of them spectacular, beautiful or bizarre, many of them morphologically remarkable or taxonomically isolated, and thus of great scientific interest. Yet it is still very imperfectly known, and amateurs (amongst them the authors of this book, and the pioneer Mrs E. A. Hodgson, to whom it is dedicated) have made outstanding contributions to that knowledge; the purpose of the book is to encourage and help other amateurs to take up the good work.

'The Liverworts of New Zealand' opens with a simple account of the morphology and life cycle of hepatics, hints on collecting, etc. It 'describes' and illustrates about 200 common or conspicu- ous species-perhaps rather less than half of the total hepatic flora, and includes keys to the genera and, for the larger genera, to the species which have been included; many of the rarer (and for the most part recently created) genera have not been mentioned. I put 'describes' in inverted commas because the 'descriptions' are rather in the nature of notes on conspicuous features of colour, habit, habitat, etc. rather than true descriptions or diagnoses. The avowed aim is to enable a beginner to identify his plants with -a hand lens, and the minimum use of a compound microscope. In some ways such an undertaking is more difficult than the preparation of a conventional flora, for it demands judgment in making the selection of species, and even greater judgment and skill in anticipating the difficulties of a beginner and making the necessary simplifications. It is, moreover, very difficult for an experienced worker to put himself in the position of a beginner and judge the beginner's reactions-a difficulty which doubtless ham- pered the authors, but which also hampers the reviewer in assessing the authors' success.

My own feeling is that the authors have been too afraid of encouraging the beginner to take the plunge, which he must take if he is going to make progress, and get down to accurate observation.

They try to evade difficulties and present facts in a popular style, and consequently there are too many vague remarks-I miss clear statements of essential details. The treatment of the Lophocoleaceae-a family richly represented in New Zealand-affords an example. The general discourse on the family on p. I27 fails to make a clear statement of the essential differences between three closely allied genera Lophocolea, Chiloscyphus and Clasmatocolea, though in fact most of the differences are mentioned. The notes on the difference between Clasmatocolea and Lophocolea, on p. I 5 I are confusing and do not altogether tally with what has been said on p. I 27;

there must be either a very unfortunate misprint or a lapsus calami when it is said that the leaves of Lophocolea are 'convex abaxially' and contrasted with the Clasmatocolea leaves which are said to be 'concave adaxially'; it is not easy to decide which is the abaxial face of a Lophocolea leaf, and it would have been clearer to describe the leaves as being 'convex upwards' or (as on p. I27

This content downloaded from 185.44.78.156 on Tue, 17 Jun 2014 01:54:16 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

294 Reviews for Clasmatocolea) 'concave upwards'. The beginner will be in difficulties with the key, for the first step in separating the three genera demands perianths, which he probably will not have, and then separates Lophocolea from Clasmatocolea by the one having bidentate and the other entire leaves, despite the fact that one of the commonest species of Lophocolea has entire leaves. A clear statement of generic characters would have taken less space and avoided all these ambiguities.

Matters have gone very badly wrong in the treatment of Aneura and Riccardia; it would have probably have been wiser not to attempt to make the relatively recent distinction, which is by no means universally accepted, between these two genera. Part of the trouble here arises because in the comparison of the two genera on p. 248 the seta and oil-body characters attributed to Aneura belong to Riccardia, and vice versa. Apart from this it is completely impossible to under- stand why Aneura palmata (Hedw.) Dum. should be allotted to Aneura and not to Riccardia-it has Riccardia oil bodies, at least in England, and a Riccardia thallus-and it is illustrated under the name Aneura palmatiloba. The remark on p. 256 that 'the width of the lobes would place [Riccardia marginata (Col.) Pears.] in Aneura, according to some criteria' seems to contradict everything that has been said about Aneura (Aneura lobes more than 5 mm broad; lobes of Riccardia marginata 'less than one mm wide'!)

It seems a pity, in treating Plagiochila not to mention the two different types of branch- intercalary and terminal-they are very easy to observe and the observation can save many a taxonomic howler. A pity, too, to make an artificial key to the genera in which the very first step requires a knowledge of the perianths; though this greatly simplifies the construction of a key it greatly reduces its value, for an artificial key is most needed for identifying sterile plants.

The line illustrations, though a little sketchy, are adequate, and will certainly be useful. The photographs, too, are good, though the reproduction obviously fails to do them justice; they will doubtless have popular appeal, but the value of photographs as an aid to the identification of bryophytes is never commensurate with the cost of their reproduction.

I have been dwelling unduly, I hope, on the worst features of the book, which contains much that is sound. Students of New Zealand hepatics have faced great initial difficulties posed by the absence of any kind of flora, a scattered and often inaccessible literature, and poor igth century foundations. This first flora, incomplete though it is, should enable a beginner to name many common species with reasonable certainty and will direct him to more authoritative papers. A commendable effort, it will certainly be useful, though it might easily have been made more useful.

E. W. JONES

Paleoecology of Terrestrial Plants. Basic principles and techniques. By V. A. KRASILOV, translated by Hilary Hardin. 64 x 9- in. Pp. viii+ 283 with i6 tables and 29 text figures. Keterpress Enterprises: Jerusalem and John Wiley & Sons. I975. Price ? I I.00.

This book is an organized digest of the world literature dealing with all aspects of the life of ancient plants and the kinds of evidence that can be used, but not with the results of such studv. Palaeoecology is when, where and how early things lived and the evidence is in graveyards of jumbled bones. But ecology is more than this for it has made for itself a mighty apparatus of theoretical ideas supported by a huge vocabulary of abstract nouns. The words daunt me but ecologists having had the right training enjoy them. But while I sometimes missed a meaning I believe the thought is clear and the translation seems good. Krasilov's judgement is good natured (he might have been caustic) and when he presents his own conclusions they are simple and direct. He is best on his own and his friend's work; pages putting together points from perhaps a dozen works are stodgy to read though a good guide to literature. There are nearly IOOO references, over half palaeobotanical, to publications in English, Russian, German and French (in that order of frequency). There is no rival to this bibliography.

The plant palaeoecologist uses anything tough and lucky enough to be preserved and his main method is to compare fossils he finds in one site with those in another of the same age or perhaps much older. His one advantage is that he has prolonged time, in every other way he is ill placed. An ecologist starts with facts that are obvious before he even stops his car; he is in heathland or fir forest but the palaeoecologist, at least if working on extinct plants, only learns

This content downloaded from 185.44.78.156 on Tue, 17 Jun 2014 01:54:16 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions