Diantha States and Jack States. Wildflowers of Wyoming. Mountain Press Publishing.

Visitors to Wyoming know this State has everything from forests to the peaks of the Grand Tetons. As you might expect, it has an amazing variety in its wildflowers too. Browsing this book brought back many memories of my time teaching in Wyoming. While helping 4-H youth, I spent time camping in the Grand Tetons, the Big Horns, and in various State parks throughout the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. This included forested campgrounds next to cool streams and log cabins near the top of the Big Horn mountain range.

Wyoming offers you the chance to study plants of the alpine, subalpine, montane, foothills, steppe, and plains vegetation zones. The authors chose sixteen representative families to illustrate. Therefore, the book begins with a brief summary of the characteristics of those families. Then you find a key to the families which hopefully, will help you narrow down your choices when identifying a plant in the field. Thumbnail photographs (colored) grouped by flower color also help you locate possibilities.

Once you have narrowed down your search and identified the plant family, then you turn to the pages discussing that particular family to try to identify the particular species. There is a description of the chief characteristics of each plant family followed by detailed descriptions of individual species. The accompanying photographs are beautiful.

Project idea: I love gardening with tiny alpine plants. Since this book brought back so many pleasant memories of my time in Wyoming, I believe I'll make a trough garden emphasizing Wyoming plants for next year. If you have visited this state, perhaps you would like to create a similar project for your yard.

Recommendations

These are all excellent books that serve their purpose. You should be able to purchase them in a local bookstore or via amazon.com. I truly appreciate the colored pictures accompanying each plant description. It seems that no matter how much I study botany, I have a hard time remembering all the details and fall back on seeing a good photograph.