Review

Secondary pollen presentation is a taxonomically widespread phenomenon that is unknown to many botanists. As defined by the author, it embraces those cases in which pollen is transferred within the flower, and presented to pollinators on or by floral structures other than the thecae. The intraflower transfer often involves intriguing adaptations of petals, androecium and distal parts of the gynoecium. The present book is largely a case of secondary presentation itself, being actually a review of the literature on the subject, supplemented with unpublished data and drawings. The main part (208 pp.) extensively describes familywise all taxa known to have secondary pollen presentation, with many comments inserted. Papaveraceae, Leguminosae, Proteaceae, Campanulaceae, Goodeniaceae and Rubiaceae provide relatively many examples, whereas secondary presentation is general in Compositae. A discussion and separate list of references conclude each family. Although the descriptions are very detailed and many cases nicely illustrated, usually with drawings from the source publications, it is sometimes hard to imagine the structures and mechanisms. It would facilitate understanding if more symbols had been used in the drawings.