Welsh Journals

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Plant and Planet: Anthony Huxley: Penguin Books: £ 1.25. This is a revised edition, in Pelican Books, of the book published by Allen Lane in 1974. The author states that it was written to stimulate interest in the world of plants and our perception of it. He begins with a brief exposition of the process of evolution and its vast time-scale and goes on to show how plants developed and how they function both within themselves and in relation to the rest of the world. Plants are essentially resilient: Morning Glory germinated in Hiroshima ten days after the atom bomb exploded. We share our planet with them; we could not survive without them. Mr Huxley's book is highly informative and thought-provoking. The Observer's Book of Wild Flowers '.Francis Rose: Warne: £ 1.25. Those who were young in 1937 may remember when this little book was first published. This, the third edition, has been completely revised, reset and reillustrated. There- are clear descriptions of 160 plants with a detailed colour illustration of each. The Dragonflies of Great Britain and Ireland: Cyril 0 Hammond: Curwen Books: £ 9.75. Earlier this year the fossil of a dragonfly was found in a Derbyshire coal seam laid down 300 million years ago. This sublime insect has, therefore, had to wait a long time for this comprehensive book, the only one now in print, illustrating the 44 British species of dragonflies and damselflies. The facing page in each case has explanatory texts and small scale maps, which are repeated on a larger scale at the end of the book. The book includes the late A E Gardner's illustrated key to the aquatic larval stages, which remains the most comprehensive published contribution to the study of this stage of metamorphosis of British dragonflies. As Cynthia Longfield says in her Foreword This is the Dragonfly book of the Century'. Vanishing Birds-Their Natural History and Conservation: Tim Halliday: Sidgwick & Jackson: £ 7.50. About 130 species of birds have become 'as dead as a Dodo' since that large flightless bird became extinct on the island of Mauritius in the seventeenth century; other species had been driven to extinction long before that, most of them by man. The author begins by tracing the evolution of birds over the last 165 million years during which, as he states, 'extinction is a natural part of the evolutionary process'. Man arrives on the scene to accelerate that process. Dr Halliday discusses in detail the history of the Dodo and the Solitaire, the Great Auk and the Pink- headed Duck, and there are chapters on the extinct and endangered species of North America, New Zealand, and Australia, and on the endangered birds of Europe (no European bird has become extinct in historical times except for the Great Auk, which was pelagic and North Atlantic). Of the 217 birds that have disappeared in the last four centuries, 200 were insular, and so there is a special chapter for island birds. In his final chapter the author considers the lessons of history and how they can be used to conserve those species endangered today. Bruce Campbell, in his Foreword, expresses his belief that 'this extremely thoughtful book will have a considerable impact on attitudes to wild life conservation in general'. Sixteen beautiful pain-