GMPHIS SCRIPTA - Universitetet i Oslo

Rqrclk review
it{erv edition of Die Flechten BadeniV,i.xrttembergs
Wirth, V. i995 Die Flechten Baden-Wtirttemfsergs,2.
Auflage, Teil I-2. Verlag Eugen
Ulrner, Stuttgart. 1006 pp. In German.
Thc first edition of Volkmar Wirth's beautiful
bock Die Flechten Baden-Wiirttembergs came in
t987. It was a great help for many people with a
starting interest in lichens. I remember often
using the book and its excellent photographs in
some brave attempts to at least get the correct
gelieric names for my collections. And I don't
tiiink tr was the only person who tried this 'easy
n,f,y' after big frustrations over a difficult
geiieral key.
In 1995, this second edition appeared.
Vihiie the first edition was one book, this edition
ccnsists of two big volumes stuffed with inforrnation
about the lichens of this German province.
It now contains 555 colour photographs
and about 1000 distribution maps, ffid, in
ccntrast to the first edition, it has now become a
r*al flora.
The photographs makes up a very important
part of this flora. They show the beauty and the
obscurity of the lichens in a way that immediately
gets one fascinated. I believe an important
airn of the flora is to arouse interest in lichens, a
group of organisms that have suffered much
because of increased air pollution, modern
forestry and an extensive agricultural developrnent.
The photographs are in general of high
quality. They are sharp, and in a high degree
showing the correct colours of the species. Most
of the pictures are close-up photographs showing
important morphological characters, but there
are also some good habitat photographs, as those
of tho roof with Rhizocafpon spp. and the forest
with Lobaria pulmonaria. There are only some
very few photographs which could be improved,
e"g" that of Clstocoleus ebenus (p. 368), which
does not tell us much more than what is said in
rhe text, and the left-hand picture of Lobaria
amplissima (p. 560), which is not good,
although it shows a large specimen with cephalodia.
I suspect that the photograph of Tephromela
aglaea in the reality shows T. perlata, a
species not known from Germany yet. This
collections of excellent colour photographs of
lichens is overwhelming, ild must be the largest
ever published. I get inspired to try some lichen
photography myself, and I miss a chapter with
technical advice !
Nearly all the illustrations have a short and
informative figure text. I noticed that the texts
for C)phelium tigillare and C. karelicum are
mixed up.
The text is filled with general information
about lichens and more specific distribution
maps, keys, and notes on the species. The introductory
chapters give general information about
lichen ecology, distribution, collecting, significant
characters and anatomy, chemistry, and
decline of lichens. In these chapters, the terminology
and abbreviations used later in the books
are explained. A heavy use of abbreviations
makes the text somewhat difficult to use in the
start; one has to turn to at least 10 pages in the
introductory chapters to fully understand the
keys and the species accounts.
The book is full of precise ecological and
distributional data which, as far as I know, has
not been presented or discussed in scientific
papers. I miss an explanation of how the data
were collected, and also more statistic presentation
of some of the data. Especially, in the
chapters on threatened species (pp. I3-L7 , 43-
44) a statistical treatment would have given a
better explanation of the chosen redlist category
for the various species. I also observe that the
German redlist categories ate rather different
from the international IUCN categories (p. 43),
and miss an explanation of why it is so, and how
these corresponds to the international standard
codes.
Continues on page 30