Bark A field guide to trees of the northeast

This reviewer always assumed that bark was too variable to use as a primary characteristic for tree identification, but natural history/tree researcher Wojtech has proven him wrong. Wojtech's guide to 67 native trees of New England and New York starts with seven fairly distinct bark types (e.g., smooth, peeling horizontally, furrowed); from there, it moves to secondary keys that rather quickly end with a tree name. Some leaf and structural characters are used in the illustrated keys, but they are based mostly on differences in bark. Species descriptions cover at least two pages each, with line drawings of a leaf, a standard twig drawing to indicate opposite or alternate leaf arrangement, and a map of the tree's range. The facing page has color photos of bark with images of young, mature, and sometimes old tree trunks. The photos are very good quality; the drawings less so, but adequate. Chapters on bark function and ecology are very informative. The species selection is a bit biased to the northern latitudes and includes only a very few invasive nonnatives. Although this reviewer has not used the guide in the field, he knows the species well enough to believe it will work fairly well. Summing Up: Recommended. All undergraduate students, researchers/faculty, and general readers. G. D. Dreyer Connecticut College