* Kudish, Michael. 1992. Adirondack Upland Flora.
The Chauncy Press, Saranac, New York.
A review, by Chuck Daniels
Linnaeus, in his 1737 Glory of the Scientist, wrote:
Good God! when I consider the melancholy fate of so many of (botany's)
votaries I am tempted to ask whether men are in their right minds who so
desperately risk life and everything else through their love of collecting
plants.
When I think of Dr. Michael Kudish, I'm reminded of the stalwart, adventurous,
almost lunatic eighteenth and nineteenth century plant hunters Linnaeus refered
to in the above passage, whose marvelous discoveries in the plant kingdom
contributed monumentally to the sciences of botany and horticulture. Possessed
of the vitality and gusto of a Philibert Commerson, and the determination
and singlemindedness of a David Douglas -- both brilliant plant hunters --
Dr. Michael Kudish, had providence placed him squarely in the Age of Reason,
would surely have rivaled the great plant hunters of the age. Alas, Dr. Kudish
was born into a more modern, tamer era, but his contribution to the science
of botany, if not heroic, is nonetheless estimable, as his Adirondack Upland
Flora adduces.
Three attributes of Kudish's work stand out as testaments of an eminently
successful flora. The first, perhaps most important, is its accessibility
to the layperson. It is written with concision and clarity, with a de-emphasis
on jargon. Plenty of maps and tables, and a sprinkling of full-page color
photos serve to break up the densely informative text. Perhaps it's Dr. Kudish's
infectious enthusiasm and years of classroom lecture experience that make
his treatise so accessible to the layperson. Fidgety and bleary-eyed college
freshmen are no obstacles to Dr. Kudish's magical ability to elucidate the
most arcane subject matter into the simplest terms to even the most
knowledge-resistant of students. And his frowzy attire and dotty manner
always seem to elicit a strange fascination from students, thus capturing
their attention. (As a student of Dr. Kudish's myself, I always wondered
if it was by chance, or by calculation, that the narrow end of Professor
Kudish's necktie invariably hung lower that the wider end.)
The second attribute, appealing especially to students of natural history
and ecology, is Kudish's in-depth discussion of the the determinants of the
plant composition of the Adirondack flora: soils and climate. Rarely does
the consulter of a flora get such enlightening background information
as Adirondack Upland Flora provides, as most floras focus singularly on
describing plants in a particular region, without providing much context
of the plant's surroundings. Kudish's "ecological perspective" is truly an
ecological perspective, not a political diatribe on how "humankind is destroying
the planet."
Adirondack Upland Flora's third attribute is, forsooth, its usefulness to
the botanist. Chapter five, the meat of the Flora, is a compendium of
what must have been thousands of pages of meticulous field notes the
indefatigable Kudish had compiled over his years of ambling the Adirondacks.
Anyone with at least a modicum of interest in botany will marvel at the depth
with which he documents the distribution of a particular plant. Along with
detailed data on site, elevation, frequency, and often phenology, the reader
is additionally treated with fascinating and offbeat oddment and miscellaneous
information:
Dead branches bright orange; the only other woody plants with orange dead
branches are big tooth aspen and white ash.
Moist blackened leaves emit butyric acid upon decay . . . permeating portions
of the Adirondacks with its putrid stench.
These are the sort of miscellaneous comments that makes this flora a delight.
Kudish's Adirondack Flora is a treat to both the botanist and casual naturalist
alike. Well worth the price, even if bought new.
The discoveries never end. –Kudish
North Country
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