Poisonous Fungi
Ramsbottom, John
£12.00
Poisonous Fungi
By John Ramsbottom
Keeper of Botany British Museum (Natural History)
With Colour Plates by Rose Ellenby
King Penguin, Penguin Books, London, 1945. First edition. Hardback. No dust jacket. Printed paper covered boards with a decorative fungi design. 12mo. 18.5cm H x 12.5cm W. 32pp, + 16 colour plates by Rose Ellenby. Bibliography. Illustrated with several line drawings to the text and colour plates.
Condition: Used. Lightly age marked & rubbed outers; Dust stained top edge; Closed tears around the backstrip, with small paper loss at the base of spine. Inside, hinges fine, no splitting; Clean, bright and tight; No tears or annotations; Small faint stamp ‘Bookworm’ to the front pastedown.
“With the gradual recognition of the essential characters for distinguishing species a more exact knowledge of the gastronomic qualities of fungi was attained. As a result we know that all rule-of-thumb methods for differentiating between edible and poisonous species are without the slightest value and, further, despite popular belief, the number of poisonous fungi is not legion but is very small: the plates in this booklet had to be eked out with edible fungi! The title ‘Poisonous Fungi’ is therefore somewhat misleading except in so far that all have been described as such sometime or other.”
A fascinating small book written by an expert on fungi, enhanced by wonderful colour illustrations.
Overall Condition – Good+