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In Texas Cacti (Texas A&M University Press, 2009, 312 pp., $24), Austin residents Brian and Shirley Loflin profile 150 or so native cacti in exquisite photographic and textual detail. Each entry lists a plant’s features (spines, flowers, fruits and seeds), habitat, flowering season and other pertinent information.
Although some of the depicted plants appear a bit hyper-natural in their color, texture and overall impression, Texas Cacti is a very handy field guide that includes rare specimens. The book is obviously a labor of love.
Love for native plants also informs Jim Stanley’s Hill Country Landowner’s Guide (Texas A&M University Press, 2009, 114 pp., $19.95). The author’s position, echoing Henry David Thoreau, is straightforward: “Regardless of what the laws and the books in the courthouse say, we don’t really ‘own’ the land, we are just the current tenants who are taking care of the place for a brief time before passing it on to the next generation. Common sense and common courtesy require that we leave the land in at least as good a condition as we found it.”
It’s a handsome book with useful chapters on brush control, grazing, erosion, cedar management, oak wilt, fire, deer and exotic plants. Stanley, a Kerrville member of the Native Plant Society of Texas, especially emphasizes land restoration. He encourages the fostering of native grasses, tree health and songbird habitats.
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