When I stumbled upon an episode of Matt Candeias’s podcast, I learned that his new book, In Defense of Plants, was coming out on February 23, 2021. So, I put it in my wish list and waited for it to be released by Audible.
Matt has a Ph.D. in ecology and, since he has a blog and podcast about plants, I liked him already. Having listened to his new book, I like him even more. The full audio runs for six hours and sixteen minutes and the narration is solid. I re-listened to the main plant chapters while I worked at my landscape side-hustle and time just flew by. Plants really are amazing.
Matt’s aim was to get more people excited about plants and, I think, he succeeds. He accomplishes this by choosing great examples of weird plant sex, seed dispersal, defenses and warfare.
Blackberry mystery solved
The common blackberry is extremely successful in the landscape. So successful that I have to take it down with a brush cutter and risk injuring my perfect skin in the process. Why is it so annoyingly successful? Well, Matt tells us in the book that the common blackberry is capable of bringing up manganese from deep within the soil. And it also concentrates manganese in its leaves. When those leaves fall and decompose, they poison the soil even more. Not many plants can survive in soils full of manganese. Now you know.
I mention blackberry because it’s an issue at work. Most of the examples discussed in the book are spectacular. I listened to the main chapters twice and, I suspect, I will do it again. It’s pure pleasure for a green professional.
Chapters 3-7 are a wild ride. Trust me. Then comes the final chapter called “The problems plants face” and it gets more serious. We face habitat destruction which leads to species loss. And we can’t afford to lose plant species.
If you enjoy this book, you will probably be motivated to help plants in your home region. Most people don’t even notice plants and yet, our lives depend on them.
I’ve written a blog post (scheduled-not yet published) about pine cones. People asked me to clean-up pine cones at a site without pines which I found strange. They were looking at the native Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii). I thought it was strange for the residents and the site foreman to not catch this. It shows how little notice people take of plants in their landscape.
This book shows you how amazing plants are. Read it soon and defend the plants in your own garden and region.
Five stars!
