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412 BLUMEA Vol. 41,No. 2, 1996 Reviews E.O. BOX, R.K. PEET,T.MASUZAWA, I.YAMADA,K. FUJ1WARA & P.F. MAY- COCK (eds.): HandbookofVegetation Science 12/1. Vegetation Science inFor- estry. GlobalPerspective basedonForestEcosystems ofEastandSoutheastAsia. Kluwer AcademicPublishers, 1995.ISBN 0-7923-2679-2.Hardcover.Price: US$ 262; NLG 450. Thiswork is largelybuiltonthepapersfromfoursymposia fromtheInternational Congress ofEcology, Yokohama 1990.Itis anadditionto volume 12ofthehand- bookofvegetation science dealing withtheapplication of vegetation science infor- estry, mostly in Europe. Thecritics ofthatvolumewouldwant amore diversified demonstrationofforestry relatedvegetation science workanda widerepresentation offorest types fromdifferentcontinents.Well,they havegot whatthey wanted, at least forAsia. Already in thefirstpart, ‘Overview’, with three chapters [1. Forest ecosystems ofEastandSoutheastAsiain aglobal perspective; 2. Climaticrelations oftheforestsofEastandSoutheastAsia; 3.Species diversity inEastAsiain aglobal perspective], thereaderis confrontedwith awealthofdata heotherwisehas tolook forin several differentplaces. Furtherparts are titled ‘Evergreen Forest Region’, ‘Summergreen Forest Region’, ‘Montane/BorealRegions’, and ‘Tropical Forest Regions’. Eachpartis dividedintoseveralto manychapters (in the wholethereare 35 chapters). In thedifferentchapters the reader, who is especially sought under fieldworkers, findsawealthofinformationon allaspects of vegetation science. One oftheinteresting things is thatin severalchapters, likethaton ‘Alpine vegetation in aGlobalperspective’, theAsianvegetation is compared withthesamevegetation in othercontinents.Concluding, it canbe saidthatthis bookis obligatory forall stu- dentsandworkers in thefieldofforestry vegetation inAsia.Eachchapteris provid- edwithalengthy listofreferences. H.P. Nooteboom C.J. SALDANHA:FloraofKarnataka. Vol. II.Podostemaceae to Apiaceae. Pub- lished by A.A. Balkema, Rotterdam,Brookfield, 1996.304 pp., 106plates (23 in colour). ISBN 90-5410-276-4.Hardcover. Price: NLG 150. Thisis thesecond partofafloraofa smallarea insouthern India.And as floras go,usefulforthelimitedpurposeitis writtenfor.However,theusefulnesscouldbe greatlyenhancedifmore vegetative characterswere includedin thekey, andifthe short descriptions were drawnmoreconsistently comparable, including thecharac- ters as given inthekey. A floralikethisonemaynot betherightplace topublish anew species (Eugenia aloysii Saldanha,p.23, fig. 68). Deviationsofthetaxonomy usedare indicated.For instance, underSarcococcaLindley(p. 161),includedintheEuphorbiaceae, itisnoted thatthisgenussometimesisplacedintheBuxaceae.However, undertheXanthophyl- laceaethereis noindicationthatthisfamilyusually is includedinthePolygalaceae. Thevolumeis adequately illustratedwithoriginal line drawings and somecolour photographs ofvariablequality. Concluding: This volumemaybeusefulforthosewith aninterestin thefloraof theKarnataka. Frits Adema