Botany is Not an Expensive Hobby!

How about starting for free? You could get a library book, or probably find a second-hand flower guide at a used book store. Learning defining family characteristics is a heck of a good start: it is satisfying to recognize these characteristics to understand when you're looking at a member of the Caryophylaceae and not Campanulaceae. Many people would be happy to recognize a genus (to tell a snapdragon from a pansy) and that's a great way to start: characteristics for plant families are often as obvious as characteristics that define animal families, and getting to genus is not much more difficult. It will take more work to identify to species.

It’s possible to identify many plants with nothing more exotic than a 10x hand lens (also called a loupe) and a book or two (no single book is going to answer all your questions). Of course it will require pretty good vision to see the tiny parts that often differentiate closely related species, but for identifying plants to family, good eyesight and this small magnifier will suffice. Buy one at a good stationery store. The 10x loupe shown here is an example of the standard lens most people want. A decent hand lens will cost under $25. See an assortment of 10x loupes on Amazon and have it delivered to your home.

When you discover the fun of seeing things up close, consider a pair of close-focusing binoculars. Huh? Binoculars? Yes; an enthusiastic yes. I bought a Pentax Papilio 8.5x21 Binocular after seeing somebody at Mt. Diablo looking at flowers that I was on my knees to see up close. These focus down to an amazing 1.6 feet. These are not just great for flowers, they work well for butterflies (“papilio” means butterfly in French), and even birding. Of course they still work for viewing distant objects but they are like having super powers to look at close things with 8+ power magnification. They are now right at the top of my list for favorite tools in the field.

Field Identification Requires a Book or Two

In most cases, field ID at the base level simply involves taking a really good look at the flower that has your attention, noting the first keying details: stamens, pistil, number of petals, sepals, and how they are assembled. It will usually be adequate to use a key from a Peterson's Guide. A 10x lens will help you see whether the parts are connected deep down into the flower, whether the plant parts are smooth or hairy, etc. Wait! Did I say hairy? You may be in for a surprise! Stems and leaves are often covered with a fine fuzziness. There are many kinds of fuzziness, or smoothness, or edges and such. The book shown here, Plant Identification Terminology is a real pleasure to have next to you when you get to look at parts. You are going to read lots of questions that use terms you have never heard, and this book has illustrations for nearly every one of them.

Having access to a nice book like Terminology will be helpful, but you clearly also need some sort of book that describes the plants of the region; a book like this is called a flora. It is more than just a collection of a few photos or drawings, it should be a generally complete list of everything that grows in a defined area. Serving a broader need, you might start out with a Peterson's Guide to Pacific Flowers. There are several other options but the Peterson book for the Pacific states has a very clear “key” to identify plant families.

A Note about Guides and ID Books..

It is likely that flora guides found on store shelves or through online sellers will not yet be up-to-date with name changes that were made a few years ago. For a list of names that have changed since the 1993 Jepson, visit the Index to Names Superseded since The Jepson Manual

An identification key is a series of paired questions of which only one should be a good choice when you are looking at a plant and answering questions about it. You choose the one option that matches and go to the step that is given as the next pair for comparison. Eventually you are expected to arrive at one final answer that identifies your plant.

In Addition to Books...

Here are a few things that can augment your botanical explorations:

A GPS for the Trail: A tool that reads satellite signals to pinpoint your location, you might wonder why this would be a part of your botany experience? Well, not only can it help you find your way back to the car, it can be used to mark locations of interesting finds so that you can share them with others, or even find that spot next year. I've used GPS for several years and love the ability to pre-plan a place to find, mark my trail, or locate spots and transfer that info to my Topo! maps. Read more...

Two-Way Radios: When we wander around looking for flowers, more often than not we wander in slightly different directions. Pretty soon we are shouting out to reconnect. It's so easy to fall behind or simply drop out of view by kneeling down to take a picture or take a closer look at a flower, others don't see you or head off in a new direction while you're distracted. The problem is easily solved with a pair of inexpensive two-way radios. "Red Dog One,... this is Red Dog Two..., over!"

The best advice I can offer is to avoid the cheapest radios (like $25/pair) that only offer eight channels with no sub channels. We tried those and found that most everyone else was also using them. The result was that we listened to everyone in range telling their friends to stop for more beer, where to park, or whatever. Do yourself a favor and spend enough to get many channels with many SUB channels, giving you a big range of possible channels to help you avoid listening the rest of the people wandering around within two miles and chatting on "your" channel.

Standard FRS (Family Radio System) radios have a two-mile range, and yes, they talk to each other no matter what brand others have. Get them at REI or Amazon if you can't get to Radio Shack. They run a very long time (multiple outings) on a set of rechargeable AAA batteries.

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