Overview
As public awareness has grown of Hawaii's unique and threatened botanical heritage - 89% of the Islands' native plants are found nowhere else in the world - interest in helping species to thrive by planting them in and landscaping projects has blossomed. But native plants are different from exotics. They propagate, bloom, and fruit in accordance with Hawaii's natural climate and on their own schedules. The knowledge of how to grow and care for these special plants has been hard to come by, passed on mostly by word of mouth, one plant at a time.Growing Hawaii's Native Plants is the consolidated resource that provides all the information needed to propagate native Hawaiian plants. Much of the knowledge found here, gathered from more than a decade of research, can be found nowhere else.
Using a clear, easy-to-read format, Growing Hawaii's Native Plants contains an extensive, thoroughly researched entry for each of the 1,104 true existing native Hawaiian species. For each entry there is a species description, information on provenance, growing methods, germination rates, pest and disease control, and most importantly, directions for outplanting.
Growing Hawaii's Native Plants is a one-stop reference work for scientists and nursery owners, conservationists and backyard gardeners alike. Tropical gardeners and conservationists around the world will also find this volume a valuable addition to the comparatively small literature on tropical plant propagation and conservation.
Included are more than 400 high-quality color images and a foreword by renowned botanist Sir Ghillean Prance, former director of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew and current scientificdirector of the Eden Project.
About the Author
Kerin Lilleeng-Rosenberger immediately recognized the special nature of Hawaii when she arrived in in 1968. Lilleeng-Rosenberger became fascinated with Hawaiian plants. Her knowledge of native plants grew as she worked at the National Tropical Botanical Garden (NTBG), the Hawaii Plant Conservation Center (HPCC), and held the position of horticultural specialist with the Research Corporation of the University of Hawaii (RCUH).
Lilleeng-Rosenberger has worked with the botanical community from across the globe on various research efforts. She has been the subject of several national and international articles on her unique knowledge, and has held classes and courses for volunteers, the scientific community, specialists and the general public. Today she is considered to be a world leader in native Hawaiian plant propagation.