by Costin, Gray, Totterdell & Wimbush
CSIRO Publishing
$59.95 (incl. GST)

This is the second edition of a comprehensive and excellent production describing the natural vegetation of the Kosciuszko alpine areas. The book contains largely very good colour photographs of plants and flowers, showing panoramas of plant communities and massed fields of plants in bloom as well as clear close-ups of individual clumps of plants and flowers which will help you with identification during your wanderings in these spectacular alpine areas.

The book includes:

• diagramatic views

• landscape sights of glacial and post-glacial history

• relation of the plants to geomorphology of the landscape

• a map of the main types of vegetation

• diagramatic sections showing vegetation according to site variations, altitude etc

• a cross-section of Murray River to Abbot Range, Kosciuszko

• a downslope sequence of solisfluction terraces

There are a few black and white photos and a description of damage done by cattle grazing in earlier days and there is a comprehensive list of species including common names, growth cycle, main habitats and distribution.

Even though you may already have the first edition, I highly recommend this book, too heavy to carry in the field, but to study as you return each day after a walk in this unique alpine paradise.

Heather Roy

by Kathy Ombler
New Holland Press
$49.95 (on view at NPA library.)

If you have never been enticed to cross the Tasman to New Zealand then this book will certainly leave you with the desire to experience the natural wonders and beauty that it offers. The reader is introduced to a country which was one of the last places on earth to see human beings, and provides the visitor with subtropical beaches and rainforests, active volcanoes and geothermal regions, mountains and glaciers.

There are 35 areas of wilderness, including national parks, described in detail. Readers are given a brief history of each area and information on wildlife, vegetation, marine life and recreational activities undertaken by locals and visitors alike. This is visually enhanced by an abundance of colour images and detailed maps.

The concluding pages give a summary of conservation areas in New Zealand, a glossary explaining such words as ‘tramping’ (a New Zealand term for hiking) and contacts for major conservation groups in New Zealand. For a great insight into the natural wonders of New Zealand this book comes highly recommended.

Karen Petley