Welsh Journals

photographs and a few drawings, and it comprises nine chapters. The earlier chapters deal with the evolutionary side, and this is also stressed later in the species accounts. Chapter 9 is very interesting in that it deals with recent introductions, even including Grass Carp. These fish are currently being used in South West Wales in aquatic weed control experiments. A chapter-based bibliography is included. An interesting book rather different and well worth reading. J.W.D. Whales, Dolphins and Porpoises. Ronald M. Lockley, David & Charles (1979) pp 200, £ 6.95. Our late editor, Ronald Lockley, has obviously spent a great deal of praiseworthy time and effort in going through the relevant literature and then boiling it down into a readable amalgamation. As well as this he has thoroughly ransacked the photographic libraries producing an absolutely stunning collection of photographs-both colour and black and white. Elizabeth Sutton's graphic sketches complete the illustrations. The book is clearly the result of a study of most of the extensive cetacean literature and yet there is only one single page of references in the bibliography. One would so like to read considerably more detail concerning some of the points but usually one does not know from where he obtained the information. The book is comprehensively divided into subject-headed chapters, all of which are very readable. Among the more striking is that on cetacean voices with their resulting astonishing echo sound-navigation (directional sonar). Pages 139 to 185 contain a detailed description of every known species and form with their world distribution. This is a tour de force in its own right. As is fitting the final chapter describes the horrific reduction in the numbers of these mammals, and the work of the International Whaling Commission in attempting to control this. L.S.V.V. The Hedgerow Book. Ron Wilson, David & Charles (1979), pp 208, £ 5.95. A well produced book even though the author has climbed on to the bandwagon initiated by Pollard's Hedges. The chapters at either end of the book are the most useful but the middle section merely catalogues hedgerow organisms with little, except some pleasing drawings, to commend it. Poor editing has left in some strange quotes e.g. "Until it (the Bank Vole) was described in 1832 it was thought to be a rarity". F.M.S. Plant Communities.A. Bulow-Olsen, Penguin Nature Guide (1978), pp 128, £ 1.95. The Biology of Flowers. E. Holm, Penguin Nature Guide (1979), pp 140, £ 2.25. Both books only thinly veil their cosmopolitan origin written in Danish, translated into English and printed in Portugal. Both are technically impressive but Plant Communities includes so many rare and non-British species at the expense of typical natural species, e.g. beech woods with an illustration of non-British Hollow Corydalis but no bluebells. that it becomes unreliable as a "British" text. The Biology of Flowers on the other hand has not suffered by translation and is in every way an excellent introductory work worthy of a place on any bookshelf. F.M.S