Two new titles, free for 90 days!

I was rather over-busy last year, I had to have some eye operations, so there wasn't much time for botany, and publishing books had to take a back seat for a while as well.

However, we're back on track now, me and my books, and I've published two more in the last couple of weeks.

Firstly, Viburnum; possibly more garden-based than field-based, but you'd be surprised how many times these pop up in hedgerows, as part of the landscape planting in industrial estates, and particularly in the communal areas of housing estates.

Free to download now from Amazon, if you have Amazon Prime or Kindle Unlimited.

Secondly, Elms: I finally got around to finishing what has to be one of the most frustrating Cribs that I have done so far.

Elms are a very difficult group, as they hybridise very freely, and even the so-called authorities of botany don't know for certain how many species there are - "between 30 and 40 species" seems to be the generally accepted number - and that means there isn't a simple list of species, nor are there good clear descriptions of each one!

So for this book, I concentrated on the ones you are most likely to find when out and about, with plenty of reminders that what you see might not necessarily match exactly with any of the descriptions you might read.

Hopefully, though, by the time you've read this book you will know what you are looking for, and the next time you chek out your local hedgerows, you will be able to spot the Elms, and understand a bit more about how they grow and why they are there.

Tree ID courses in London this year

If anyone is interested in learning more about tree ID, here are a couple of courses being held by the FSC (Field Studies Council) in Bushy Park over the next couple of months:

Saturday February 25th 2017: Tree ID in Winter for the FSC:

This is suitable for complete beginners: even if you can't really recognise trees in summer, you can still learn to do it in winter, and just think how much easier it will be once they have leaves! A short one-day introduction to the subject, we will spend the morning doing "Identifying", by working through the keys in the FSC's own Guide to Winter Trees, then in the afternoon we'll be doing the short-hand version, "Recognising", using my Cribs: and yes, you get to keep the Crib afterwards!

If you can't make the date or location, check out my book on the subject, Winter Tree ID, free to download if you have Kindle Unlimited or Amazon Prime, and only a few pounds, if you don't.

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Saturday March 18th 2017: Introduction to Conifers for the FSC:

If you think you know nothing at all about Conifers, this is the course for you! It's a one-day course, with a lot to cover, but by the end of the day you will be able to recognise most of the commonly-found Conifers in the UK to genus level. No, not genius level, genus level - being a genius would take more than one day...  if you can't make the date or the location, this course is based around my book Conifer Basics, which is an easy introduction to a difficult subject.

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Saturday March 25th, 2017: How to Be a Self-Employed Gardener for the WFGA:

A chance to ask me any questions you like about starting up in business: having done it myself, and having quite literally written the book on this subject - How To Be A Self-Employed Gardener, to be precise - I am always happy to talk about it, and to answer questions, to encourage more people to take this step and become self-employed as Gardeners. Even if you are already self-employed, this workshop will help and encourage you to take it to the next level, to be better: and to charge a realistic rate for it!

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Saturday May 20th, 2017:  Introduction to Broad-leaved Trees for the FSC:

An easy introduction to our common street trees: if you struggle to spot an Oak from a Sycamore, this course will show you what to look for and how to use a Key to narrow down the options.

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Field Guides: yes, still going!

Well, it's been a while since I posted here, but I am still producing Field Guides, and I'm nearly half way through publishing the whole set.

The latest one came out two days ago,

...and as the title would suggest, it's a guide to identifying the various Redwoods that we have in the UK.

I find that their names are so contradictory - if Sequoia is Californian Redwood, then surely Meta-sequoia ought to be Giant Redwood, yes?

No. It's Dawn Redwood, the deciduous one.

Giant Redwood is Sequoiadendron.

With this confusion in mind, I made a Crib for them, and I still have to refer to it every time I look at these trees, as I seem to have a complete blind spot for this family!

Anyway, the book is now out, here's a direct link to it, or you can go to my Author Page and check out the whole list.

As always, these books are FREE to download if you have Amazon Prime or Kindle Unlimited, and it doesn't even matter if you don't have a Kindle, as Amazon kindly provide a free programme ("app") to allow you to download them to your pc, laptop, or other device.

So there you are, no need to ever be confused about Redwoods ever again!

You know you're a Botanist when...

.... you look up how to make an origami Bellflower, you successfully make one:

And then you look at it in dissatifaction and say "but Bellflowers have five petals...."

*sigh*

Note: when I say Bellflower, I mean Campanula.

Free Field Guide this weekend: Poppies

Rather out of season, but I was writing an article on Poppies the other day, which prompted me to finish this Field Guide, which I started last year and never quite got around to publishing.

Everyone knows what a Poppy is, but are you sure it's Papver rhoeas, or is it P. dubium?

And what about Welsh, Horned and Californian? Would you recognise an Opium Poppy if you saw one?

Here it is, then, the answers to all these questions and lots more information about Papaver and "other things called poppies", all in one neat package, for less than the price of a cup of coffee, but FREE this coming weekend.

Amazon work on US time, by the way, so although it is free from midnight on Friday night, in the UK it won't appear to be free until about mid-morning on Saturday, and will continue to be free right over into the small hours of Monday.

And of course if you have Kindle Unlimited, or Amazon Prime, then you can download it for free at any time ("whoopee!"), but if you don't, then hang on until the weekend and get it free then.

If you don't have a Kindle, that's not a problem, Amazon kindly provide a free programme ("app") so you can download it to your own device, and if you don't have a tablet, it still doesn't matter as you can even download it to your PC or laptop.

 As I said last time, if you have any comments on the book, do please email me on rachy.ramone@gmail.com, as I love to hear from people who have used the Cribs, and quite often there are good suggestions which I am very happy to incorporate. Also, if there is a group of plants that you are struggling with, do let me know as there might already be a Crib for them, in which case I will bump it up the publication list: I still have over 30 or so to do, and as I work full time, it is taking me quite a while to get through them all: let's hope for a couple of rainy weeks when I can't get out to work..... *laughs*

Finally, if you like it, do please leave a Review on Amazon, as that will encourage other people to download it.  

New Field Guide out: Free this weekend!

Last week I finished uploading and publishing another of my Field Guides, this one is for the slightly esoteric selection of Acacias:  trees that look like Acacias, that are called Acacias, and that have pinnate leaves and spines, and which might get confused with Acacias.

But Amazon made a slight bish with the cover:

Can you spot the mistake?

Yes - *sigh* - they used the Scabious cover.

Dratski!

I waited a couple of days for them to sort it out, but a sorting out was not forthcoming, so in the end I had to unpublish the book, then create a new listing. However, it was not all a bad thing, as I spotted a spelling mistake, and then I looked at the next paragraph and thought that, actually, I could reword it to make it a bit easier to understand.

Anyway, it is now done, and available for FREE download if you have Kindle Unlimited or Amazon Prime: and if not, well, it's only the cost of a cup of coffee,  and you need never again be confused by this group of trees.

However, as I like to spread the good word of Botany amongst my fellow iSpotters, I'm offering it FREE this weekend, Sat/Sun 21st and 22nd November, so hang on until then.

Oh,  and talking of the principle of free download weekends, I have noticed that Amazon, being an american company, have a rather jingoistic approach to their timekeeping.

So when I say "free on Sat/Sun" it will actually start being free when America starts the day, which is roughly 5 hours after we do... and it will continue to be free on Sunday night, long after midnight.

I expect to see, over the next few weeks, a whole pile of iSpot Observations of this group of trees!

New Field Guide out today - Wild Roses

There have been a few iSpot Observations recently dealing with Field Rose, Dog Rose etc, and it seemed that quite a few people were not entirely sure of the differences, so here we are:

...my Field Guide to the commonest wild roses that you are likely to find whilst out and about in the UK countryside.

It's available now, HERE, on Amazon.

As always, these Field Guides are not intended to replace proper botany reference books, they are intended to provide a quick and easy reference resource for differentiating between each group.

I found this Crib to be a very easy one to write: once I got started, I found that the differences in the wild roses are actually very straightforward, unlike the pesky Veronicas (a book that I am going to revise almost immediately after publishing it, as I think it could be clearer..), but this one is nice, very easy to use.

As always, if you have Kindle Unlimited, or Amazon Prime, then you can download it for free at any time ("whoopee!"), but if you don't, then hang on until next weekend and get it free then.

Yes, it will be FREE to download next weekend, the 10th and 11th October.

If you don't have a Kindle, that's not a problem, Amazon kindly provide a free programme ("app") so you can download it to your own device, and if you don't have a tablet, it still doesn't matter as you can even download it to your PC or laptop.

You can't get any more helpful than that!

If you have any comments on the book, do please email me on rachy.ramone@gmail.com, as I love to hear from people who have used the Cribs, and quite often there are good suggestions which I am very happy to incorporate. Also, if there is a group of plants that you are struggling with, do let me know as there might already be a Crib for them, in which case I will bump it up the publication list: I still have 40 or so to do, and as I work full time, it is taking me quite a while to get through them all, but I hope to have them all published before the end of the year.

Or maybe before the end of next year.... *laughs*

Finally, if you like it, do please leave a Review on Amazon, as that will encourage other people to download it.