A previous post on this blog looked at the basic field guides one would want for this particular area of the world (Kwa-Zulu Natal, South Africa). I also mentioned in that blog post the extent to which I have been rather sucked into obtaining more and more field guides over the past few years. So here’s a whole new post about field guides!

Orchidaceae is one of the biggest plant families and is one that probably everyone in the world, regardless of background, are aware of. Orchids have garnered the attention of sappy romantics, horticulturalists and scientists alike. I am well aware of the stigma surrounding us orchid people as well as the flack we get from other scientists who don’t like orchids. But I like them anyway. They’re beautiful, intricate, varied, and often rare. The search for natural species is full of legend and hunting for them yourself can be fun in and of itself before even the great joy of actually finding them.

Right, onto the field guides! These are all of the guides made exclusively about South African orchids, from Bolus to the latest Johnson and Bytebier publication.

• The Orchids of the Cape Peninsula (1889) and the three volumes of Orchids of South Africa (1896-1913) by Harry Bolus is basically a salivating option for those of us interested in field guides and orchids. Packed with beautiful illustrations of exquisite detail done by the master himself, these books took many years of research, expeditions and previous published lists. So vast was his work that the third volume of Orchids of South Africa could only be published after his death by his assistant. The peculiar little orchid genus, Neobolusia, is named after him.

• An Introduction to the South African Orchids by Schelpe (1966) is just that; an introduction and a great way to start exploring the orchids of South Africa and beginning your journey learning about them.
• Wild Orchids of Southern Africa by Stewart, Linder, Schelpe and Hall (1982) has fabulous keys which helps not only if you’re struggling to know what the species or genus of the orchid you just found is, but also for those of us who are keen in adding to our knowledge of the intricacies of orchids.
• Orchids of Southern Africa by Linder and Kurzweil (1999) covers all known species at that time and includes color photographs and helpful descriptions of the genera.

Now for some oddballs… Or those books that are useful for very particular reasons (other than simply collecting, which is still a worthy reason to own these books thank you very much).

• Epiphytic Orchids of Southern Africa by Harrison (1972) is a great guide to bring along to the field, being small and including maps and illustrations for each species. If I know I’m going somewhere with at least one tree, I tend to take my copy along.
• Southern African Epiphytic Orchids by Ball (1978) is an excellent collection of epiphytic orchids, complete with over-sized pages which house life-size illustrations.
• Field Guide to the Orchids of Northern South Africa and Swaziland by McMurtry, Grobler, Grobler and Burns (2008) covers the almost half of all South African orchids that occur in the northern provinces, extending to Swaziland.
• Wild Orchids of the Southern Drakensberg by Braby (2019) is a peculiar book to be sure. Written, photographed and published by a self-professed religiously fanatic orchid hunter, this book is plain and simple; it is one person’s enthusiasm for the orchids in the area in which the live as portrayed by many hunts resulting in a gloriously glossy photographic journal. It is precisely what many of us wish to obtain on our computers or hard drives and occasionally waste away much time imagining it as such a beautiful book.

Steven Johnson, our esteemed pollination lab leader, is luckily one of those scientists interested in orchids. And so is Benny Bytebier, our esteemed systematics lab leader. So much so that the best, most up-to-date field guides on orchids in South Africa have been written and collated by them.

• The Cape Orchids by Liltved and Johnson (2012) covers those orchids that occur in the infamous cape region of the country. These two volumes perhaps shouldn’t be referred to as a field guide given its bulky nature. However, this bulkiness is attributed to being full of photos, illustrations, a history of botanical exploration in the area as well as a generous enthusiasm toward Bolus.
• Orchids of South Africa: A Field Guide by Johnson and Bytebier and photographs by Herbert Starker (2015). Now this is an actual field guide and can easily fit in a backpack and be checked for useful notes on how to differentiate species or check interesting factors such as what the pollinator may be. It covers the more than 450 species to be found in this country with distributions and descriptions taken from recent finds and herbarium records.

Text: Hannah Butler.

PS. If you think I’m the only blogger nuts about South African orchid field guides, here’s a blog post on one of these books by a total stranger who doesn’t even live in South Africa.

http://orchidgrrlnyc.blogspot.com/2017/07/southern-african-epiphytic-orchids-by.html