Gebirgsflora und Baume des Kaukasus [Mountain Flowers and Trees of Caucasia]

Caucasia lies between the Black and Caspian Seas and on the boundary between Europe and Asia. It includes the highest, most dramatic, least spoiled and least known mountain ranges of the northern hemisphere after the Himalayas and Rockies. The area supports about 6,400 species of vascular plant of which a quarter occur nowhere else (i.e. they are endemic to the region), and about 850 species of vertebrate animal of which some 120 are endemic. This is the highest percentage of endemism in the temperate world, and makes Caucasia one of the most important hotspots of biodiversity on Earth.This book describes and illustrates in full colour nearly all the wild flowers, trees and shrubs that can be found over 1000 metres above sea level – almost a thousand species. The authors hope that this field guide will encourage you to visit the mountains of Caucasia to look at their unique and spectacular assemblage of flowering plants, and so help justify its continued existence.