Lee, the Audubon Field Guide to Trees is a good carry with you ID book. It shows leaves, twigs and buds, flowers, fruit and bark and with good descriptive text. There are other more specific books but this book will get you well down the road.
Thanks Pat, I don't have the
Audubon Field Guide to Trees, I do have two others in that series...
North American Wildflowers (Eastern Region) &
North American Reptiles & Amphibians, these all have a plastic/vinyl type cover. My Grandmother also recently gave my two boys another smaller version of these guides entitled
The Audubon Society Pocket Guides - Familiar Trees of North America (Eastern Region) &
Familiar Flowers of North America (Eastern Region). These are a nice handy sized book...I slip them into a quart sized zip-lock baggy and keep them in my small pack (where I keep a small tree saw, pruning shears, tape measure, long fixed blade knife, etc. This pack goes with me on all my "tree hikes" when I'm on the hunt for bow wood or arrow shafts.
However, if I didn't already own these (gifts from family) I would be firmly in Justin's camp. I am extremely anti-Audubon...being a Falconer I'm sure you can imagine the struggles we have dealing with them and unfortunately they have a huge influence here in MI on our DNR & Michigan United Conservation Club and actually help to set policy on a number of nature/outdoor related issues. We lost our Dove Hunting rights because of them and they've tried hard to make Falconry illegal as well...
I just went digging through our book shelves and noticed I also own a copy of
National Geographic's - Field Guide to the Trees of North American, The Essential Identification Guide for Novice and Expert. This book actually appears to have a Novice's 101 type approach showing bark, fruits, cones, twigs, buds, leaves, etc...but the pictorial portions of this guide are illustrations not photographs but I think I will toss it in a zip-lock and into my pack as well.
Thanks again guys...I appreciate the dialogue and assistance on this ID.
