Insectivorous Plants. Second thousand.
€300 · Offered by Librairie Clavreuil · No longer available
Freeman, F-1218 ; voire Norman, 601 (premier tirage). Édition originale, deuxième tirage, de cette importante étude sur les plantes carnivores. « Darwin’s work on insectivorous plants began by accident. While on holiday in the summer of 1860, staying with his wife’s relatives in Hartfield, Sussex, he went for long walks on the heathland and became curious about the large number of insects caught by the common sundew ( Drosera rotundifolia )…. Most of Darwin’s experimental work was on Drosera and this was subject of the first twelve chapters of his resulting book. After Dionaea , of all the other insectivorous plants he worked on, Darwin spent the most time studying Utricularia (bladderworts). At first he could not work out how they caught their prey, finding it difficult to manipulate the tiny bladders under the microscope, and complaining ‘The negative work takes five times more time than the positive.’ The breakthrough came when aristocratic horticulturist Dorothy Nevill leant him a plant of Utricularia montana Insectivorous plants was published on 2 July 1875 and it was immediately clear that Darwin had been too desponding about the potential sales of the work, as 1700 copies sold straight away. A second and third thousand copies were printed off quickly with a fourth thousand following in 1876 (University of Cambridge, Darwin Correspondence Project). « Among carnivorous plants, Darwin was particularly fascinated by the speed and sensitivity of snap-traps in Dionaea and Al
- Binding: Hardcover
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