Insect-Eating Plants and How to Grow Them

by Adrian Slack

Book Overview

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0295966378
• ISBN13: 9780295966373
• Release Date: January 1988
• Publisher: University of Washington Press
• Length: 172 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Age Range: 22 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

A Great Book On Cultivation of Carnivorous Plants

I have only been growing Carnivorous Plants for slightly over three years and while there are several books about the physiology of carnivorous plants there are only four I would consider as important to dealing with how to grow them with success. This book ranks up there in the top two. Adrian Slack is well known in the Carnivorous Plant Societies and has two books out on the subject. This title is the better of the two. He goes over the main cultivation points of Carnivorous Plants in general and then goes into detailed descriptions of the different genera available at the time of the book's publication. Some of the scientific names have been changed since this book was released. This book needs to be re-released as it is currently out of print and copies tend to be expensive. If you can not afford a copy of this book then purchase The Savage Garden: Cultivating Carnivorous Plants as much of the same cultivation information appears in this excellent book as well.

Nice book if you can get it

As I kid I tried growing venus fly-traps several times - never successfully, however. I imagined such an exotic-looking plant must surely come from the Congo or some other dark and dank jungle. It wasn't until I found this book at my local library - and convinced my dad to let me try just one more time - that I was able to successfully grow not just flytraps but any other CPs (carnivorous plants) I was lucky enough to find for sale. To my knowledge, this was the first cultivation book written for CPs. True, most newcomers to the hobby will probably find "The Savage Garden" more helpful, but this book is still an excellent reference. The book was written from the perspective of growing the plants in the UK but the advice was easy enough to understand and adapt to my local US conditions. It covered all the basics I was ignorant of and whet my appetite for many of the other varieties that are pictured so beautifully on it's pages. I would still love to find some of the author's Saracenia cultivars, such as 'Lochness' and 'Daniel Rudd.' The only problem is actually finding a copy in decent condition for a reasonable price. My local library had a copy (which probably spent more time in my home than on the library shelves) but I'd love to have a personal copy. With any luck maybe they'll reissue it someday. And by the way, I learned from this book that flytraps are NOT native to the Congo but rather the extremely exotic location of North Carolina. EDIT 3/26/09 - I found out last month that this book HAS been reissued. A reformatted copy came out in 2006 called "Insect Eaters." Mine just arrived a couple days ago and as near as I can tell the text and photos are all the same, although most of the photos are smaller than in the original and maybe drawings of genlisea traps weren't included (going off memory, though).