This annual publication needs no introduction in the gardening world. Along with its more recent companions Garden Finder and Event Finder it is an essential tool to any serious plants person and extremely useful to any ordinary gardener. Its basic function is to allow the user to look up a plant name and find the nurseries which sell it. Some users are put off by the fact that scientific plant names are used, but this is really essential to avoid confusion, and thanks largely to the plethora of gardening programmes on television, people are much more comfortable with these names than they once were.
In this new edition, over 70,000 plants, herbaceous, shrubs and trees, are listed from over 800 UK nurseries with locations ranging from the north of Scotland to southwest England. Many people do not realise that fruits are also covered and a few vegetables, but not so many of the latter as, of course, most vegetables are not sold as plants but as seeds. As an apple enthusiast I was most impressed by the listing for this fruit which certainly reflects the recent widespread interest in preserving the many varieties bred in the UK.
New features in this edition include plant hardiness ratings for all those plants that have been given the RHS Award of Garden Merit. There are four categories of hardiness, H1 is for those plants requiring a heated greenhouse and ranging down to H4 for plants that are fully hardy throughout the UK.
In the list of nurseries a new symbol indicates which of them will deliver to shows and there are many Ordnance Survey grid references to aid the user to locate unfamiliar names. This is particularly helpful as many smaller nurseries, which often feature unusual plants, are unable to offer a mail order service.
In the specialist Nursery section, seven extra plant groups are now represented and there is a new explanation of plant nomenclature. There is a bibliography of book titles used in the compilation of the Plant Finder, a bibliography of international plant finders and three nursery indexes, by code, by name and a smaller one by specialism and 11 pages of maps showing locations.
Also available for searching on the RHS Web site ( www.rhs.org.uk) and in CD‐ROM, this hardy annual is a snip at £12.99 and should be found in every public library as well as every plantsman’s collection.
