The Best Australian Science Writing 2015 (2015) - Plot & Excerpts
So instead I’ll ask, ‘what was the first field guide you remember using?’ I remember two: Trees of Victoria by Leon Costermans – a permanent resident of the car glove box – and Birds of the Ranges by the Gould League. I am indebted to the authors and illustrators of both. Without them, I might have led a different life. Our Costermans bore the hallmark of a truly great field guide; after years of abuse, we stripped it of every skerrick of resale value. One summer, someone put a block of copha in the car glove box to protect it from the sun. When discovered weeks later, everything floated in a pool of coconut fat. It was awesome. Costermans was indestructible. Like the trees inside it, we created the world’s first rip-proof, waterproof, scented and highly combustible field guide to eucalypts. * * * * * What makes a field guide truly great? There are four rules. Every great guide must be: (1) distinctive, (2) attractive, (3) well organised, and, most important of all, (4) impeccably accurate.
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