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| Tim Rich measuring autumn felwort Oxwich, 2018 Image: Naomi Rich |
BSBI members will be able to benefit from an exclusive introductory offer of £12.50 (plus P&P) which will save them £5 compared the RRP of £17.50.
There are two co-authors behind this new book:
Tim Rich, author or co-editor of many prestigious BSBI publications, such as
the Plant Crib and Handbooks on Crucifers,
on Whitebeams and on British
Northern Hawkweeds; and Andy McVeigh, joint County Recorder for Buckinghamshire.
I
spoke to Tim and asked him to tell us a bit more about Gentians of Britain and Ireland.
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| Derek Hill with trumpet gentians, 2008 |
LM: Tim, the new book is 180 pages long and
covers 18 species and four hybrids in the Gentian family (Gentianaceae). When
did you and Andy start working on the book?
TR: The
idea for a BSBI gentian identification Handbook came to me when Derek Hill
showed me the trumpet gentian Gentiana acaulis on the North Downs in 2008 – it
had been wrongly identified as G. clusii - and I thought the gentian would make
a stunning book cover; if you have a cover you need a book to go inside!
With the ups and downs of life, nothing
further happened until I was snowed in by the Beast-from-the-East in February
2018 – to my surprise the draft was completed 10 days later.
That sounds a little glib, but the draft was
built on the pioneering work of Noel Pritchard on Gentianella and Frances
Ubsdell on Centaurium and integrated the additional published and unpublished work
we’d done with so many other collaborators over the last 26 years. We took another year to finish it off
together, Andy being very good at sorting out my inconsistencies!
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| Andy measuring dune gentians at Pembrey, 2003 |
LM: Could you give us an example please of
one of the species you cover and what we can expect to find out from the new
Handbook about its identification, distribution and current status?
TR: The two main changes are in Centaurium where
the intermediate centaury C. intermedium is now accepted as a species as demonstrated
by Ubsdell in the 1970s, and in the Gentianella amarella group.
As an example
of the latter, whilst looking at the wider European context of Gentianella
uliginosa, our studies with Gerrard Oostermeijer and co-workers showed that the
British plants previously referred to G. uliginosa are in fact a new endemic Dune
gentian G. amarella subsp. occidentalis. This is an annual, with few internodes and out-curved, unequal sepal lobes, restricted to dune slacks in Wales and England.
Surveys by Lyn Evans in 2019 (too late for the Handbook) are showing it
is now only present in worryingly small quantities.
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| Coastal grasslands at Farr, Bettyhill, Sutherland |
LM: You must have visited a lot of
locations across Britain and Ireland in the course of your research. Are there
any that particularly stand out in your memory?
TR: The wonderful coastal grasslands of Sutherland
makes your heart soar with sheer joy at the sight of sheets and sheets of field
gentian Gentianella campestris and northern felwort Gentianella amarella subsp.
septentrionalis amongst the other treasures.
Who needs tropical rain forest?
LM: How about herbaria – did you also look
at herbarium specimens?
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| Specimen of Willow gentian Gentiana asclepiadea Natural History Museum, London |
These specimens were essential to help assess the variation within species and their distributions.
One lesson learnt was that measurements of
herbarium material do not match measurements of fresh material, due to
shrinkage.
LM: Illustrations are an important part of
any BSBI Handbook and I see that Gentians of Britain and Ireland is illustrated
in full colour throughout. Who provided the drawings and photographs?
TR: No point in having a gentian Handbook
without colour! Andy and I have taken
the bulk of the photographs ourselves, but we have also used some lovely ones
from other people such as the spring gentian Gentiana verna cover photo by
Jonathan Mullard.
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| Seaside centaury Centaurium littorale |
There is a lovely
painting of marsh gentian Gentiana pneumonanthe by Pat Donovan which she did
for me as a memory of Ashdown Forest. The line drawings are mine – functional and accurate but not
beautiful.
LM: Ooh I think you're being a bit hard on yourself there Tim! Example on the left so people can make up their own minds... And I imagine there are BSBI distribution maps for each species?
TR: There are pre/post 1987 maps indicating
the general distributions but these will shortly be superseded by the Atlas 2020 maps. With hindsight, the size of the maps in the handbook is probably too
small to read!
LM: Tim, thank you very much for talking to
us about the forthcoming Handbook. We’d like to congratulate you and Andy for
all the hard work that have gone into this new title. Can’t wait to
see the book once it’s published!
Visitors to this year’s BSBI Exhibition Meeting at the Natural History Museum on 23rd November have a huge treat in store
– we’ll be launching the book there with a presentation from Tim, which builds on the very popular talk about British and Irish gentians that he gave at the 2018 BSBI Recorders’ Conference.
So now you'll want to hear how to get
hold of a copy of the new Handbook!
If you are a BSBI member, there is a flyer
tucked inside the September issue of BSBI News which is winging its way to you
as we speak. It explains how BSBI members can benefit from our exclusive offer
and save £5 compared to the RRP. You can either order your copy by post before
the end of November or else click here to
land on the members-only area of the BSBI website (you'll need to have your
password to hand – email me if you’ve forgotten it – don’t forget to
include your membership number).
If you are not a BSBI member, you have two
options: you will be able to buy the book from Summerfield Books and
other natural history book-sellers as of 1st December. Or why not join BSBI and enjoy
all the benefits of membership, including this special offer?
Take a look at this page which lists all the benefits of BSBI membership and there's a secure payment option, making it very quick
and easy for you to become a BSBI member and start getting involved.
October really is the ideal month in which
to join BSBI if you haven't already! The special offer on Gentians of Britain and Ireland runs until the end of November. And of course if you join BSBI
after 1st October, you get three "free" months and then your
subscription starts "properly" in January 2020 and runs until the end of 2020. Over the
next few days, we will also be telling you about the other BSBI titles due for
publication this autumn and about the savings on offer to BSBI members. Watch
this space!
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