Timber Press Encyclopedia of Flowering Shrubs

Description

Rich attributes including vibrant colour, fragrance, and sheer variety of form make flowering shrubs the most rewarding of garden plants, but this vast group with its scores of tempting plants - including abutilons, camellias, viburnums, and witch hazels - requires careful navigation. Leading expert on woody plants Jim Gardiner has distilled several decades of knowledge and experience into The Timber Press Encyclopaedia of Flowering Shrubs, an incomparable pictorial reference of hardy shrubs that excel in temperate-zone gardens. This highly illustrated guide (with 2000 high-quality images) features more than 1700 plants organised alphabetically by botanical name and readily accessed using the common name index. Gardiner has chosen the best flowering shrubs for gardeners, from the Abelia, Buddleja, and Camellia to the Xanthoceras, Yucca, and Zanthoxylum. Essential horticultural notes accompany each entry and include expected height and spread after 10 years, season of flowering, preferred position, soil and pruning requirements, USDA hardiness zone rating, and more. With wise selection and care, flowering shrubs can be the making of a garden irrespective of its size, location, or the time of year. This important new book is the essential reference on the subject that no discerning horticulturist, landscape designer, or gardener should consider being without.

Jim Gardiner is Director of Horticulture and Chief Curator for all the RHS gardens in the UK. A highly respected plantsman in the international gardening community, Jim frequently lectures and writes articles for a range of horticultural publications. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Horticulture and has authored several books, including Magnolias: A Gardener's Guide.

"Worth its (considerable) weight in gold."--Jane Berger "Garden Design " Lastly, a new reference book no serious gardener will want to be without: The Timber Press Encyclopedia of Flowering Shrubs by Jim Gardiner, the director of horticulture at the RHS (Timber Press, GBP35): 2,000 pictures, brief but authoritative cultivation data, organised alphabetically by botanical name: the business, in short. -- The Evening Standard