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About the book
In 1975, dendrologist Zsolt Debreczy and nature photographer István Rácz (then still a university student) set themselves a goal: to search out and document all the conifers in the world's temperate zones and their adjacent regions - if possible in their most pristine natural habitats. Over the next thirty years, and with the eventual assistance of over a hundred nature-loving volunteers, generous financial supporters, and field associates from hundreds of regional/local institutes and organizations, Debreczy and Rácz spent almost 2,000 days (over five continuous years) in the field on the trail of conifers. They were able to visit and document the world's most inaccessible conifer taxa and to include the accompanying flora and vegetation in their documentation. They compiled a collection of 340,000 photographs representing thousands of taxa and backed with precise documentation. In the Conifers Around the World they present 500 species of conifers of 52 genera, including several that were new to science.
This enormous collaborative effort has resulted in
Conifers Around the World (CAW)
the world's first, comprehensive, consistently illustrated color encyclopedia of temperate zone conifers.
"A fascinating display of authentic, field-recorded images with professional text and taxonomic treatment. Its bark gallery, distribution maps and illustrated introduction to genera are just as excellent as the species plates themselves,"
comment by renowned plant chemo-taxonomist and geneticist Professor R.P. Adams after a pre-publication review of CAW's plates.
CAW 's two, full-color, 32 x 24 cm (12 x 9") volumes offer the reader:
• an in-depth, richly illustrated introduction to conifers and the regions to which they are native.
• 520 Species plates, arranged geographically into fourteen regions, each containing three to five detail shots that highlight the species' most characteristic features and one shot showing the tree(s) growing in the wild. A brief text accompanying each plate provides essential descriptive and historical information.
• 120 habitat photographs showing the most picturesque conifer habitats on five continents.
• a unique Bark Gallery containing 740 color photographs taken in the wild.
• 500 detail drawings presenting the morphological characters of each of the 52 genera covered.
• 500 distribution maps that provide a visual image of the natural range of each species discussed.
Conifers Around the World will appeal to a wide variety of readers, from scholars to armchair travelers. The book's unique organization presents the species by region, offering a realistic picture of their worldwide distribution. Starting in Europe, the reader is invited to follow the conifers through Asia Minor and North Africa to China and Japan, then to the Americas (explored from west to east and then south), and finally to Tasmania and New Zealand. By presenting, for example, all the Southeast Asian conifers consecutively on 150 pages, their whole ecological range is brought together as never before. One can, as it were, audition a region's trees in the wild, and see how great age and the forces of nature can vary the appearance of even well known species.
• Plant scientists will find that this first compendium of color photographs of conifers in the wild is a welcome opportunity to see the trees in their natural habitats, rather than in herbaria or drawings. They can also use the plates to compare trees within their home region or to study conifers in regions they plan to visit.
• Foresters and horticulturists will find pictures of trees they know mostly from cultivation and can see, for perhaps the first time, how mature specimens appear in the wild and how they differ from habitat to habitat.
• All conifer enthusiasts will experience the conifers' huge range of diversity throughout a variety of stunning landscapes and may be challenged to undertake their own explorations.
The authors hope is that Conifers Around the World will provide all readers with an understanding of the variability and biodiversity of the conifers in context of the surrounding flora perhaps, a sense of the magnificence of the natural harmony of our entire planet as well. The book is not, primarily, a taxonomic work. The authors felt it was more important to emphasize the range of diversity conifers can embrace. Subspecies and variaties are included, as are common and local plant names (in addition to English and Latin). For each conifer has its culture - in the anthropological as well as the botanical sense - and the better we understand a culture, the more likely we are to think it worth saving.
Zsolt Debreczy, Ph.D., 64, is Research Director of the International Dendrological Research Institute, Inc. (IDRI) in Boston, Massachusetts, USA, a position he has held since 1990. He holds a Ph.D. in biology and began his career as curator of the higher plant collection at the Botanical Department of the Natural History Museum in Budapest, Hungary. Beginning in 1988, he spent three years as a Mercer Fellow and Visiting Scientist at the Arnold Arboretum at Harvard University. In 1994 he was a founding member of the International Dendrological Foundation. He organized and led the many explorations worldwide that provided the material for Conifers Around the World. 
István Rácz, Ph.D., 53, holds his degree in forest botany and is curator of the conifer collection at the Botanical Department of the Hungarian Natural History Museum. He is an associate of the International Dendrological Research Institute Inc., Massachusetts, USA and is a member of the board of the International Dendrological Foundation. He has worked with Zsolt Debreczy since 1975. With Debreczy, he was a Mercer Fellow and Visiting Scientist at the Arnold Arboretum at Harvard University from 1988 to 1991. He participated in most of the field work that made Conifers Around the World possible, in addition to contributing the high-quality, artistic photographs and managing the background documentation.
New Zealand, November 1998During an "Globewatch" trip on a rainy day, while documenting some of the temperate conifers and their associated plants.
China, September 1998With colleagues from the National Herbarium (PE), Institute of Botany, Academia Sinica, Beijing, on a visit to the experimental station devoted to the study and propagation of Cathaya argyrophylla, near Xinning, southern Hunan.
Mexico, September 2004Zsolt Debreczy with local guides and helpers, and branches of Abies hidalgensis collected near Metepec, Hidalgo.
Japan, October 1997
Field work with local experts and international volunteers in the University Forest, University of Tokyo, in Hokkaido.
North America, July 1999 Official guides of the Torreya State Park assisting the documentation of Torreya taxifolia, a rare and endangered species of the southeastern flora.
Chile, January1996 With Earthwatch volunteers in front of a very old tree of Araucaria araucana, in the Conguillio National Park in the vicinity of Temuco.
• Abies densa
• Abies fansipanensis
• Abies forrestii
• Abies holophylla
• Abies kawakamii
• Abies koreana
• Abies nebrodensis
• Abies spectabilis
• Abies squamata
• Abies veitchii
• Austrocedrus chilensis
• Cephalotaxus oliveri
• Cupressus torulosa
• Halocarpus biformis
• Juniperus angosturana
• Juniperus komarovii
• Juniperus saltuaria
• Larix mastersiana
• Larix potaninii
• Picea alcoquiana
• Picea meyeri
• Pinus caribaea var. bahamensis
• Pinus clausa
• Pinus dalatensis
• Pinus krempfii
• Pinus roxburghii
• Pseudolarix amabilis
• Taxus floridana
• Thuja standishii
• Thuja sutchuenensis
• Tsuga caroliniana
• Tsuga dumosa
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