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Pacific Seaweeds: Updated and Expanded Edition
What is rich with vitamins, minerals, carbohydrates and proteins, is used to develop everything from cosmetics to pesticides and can be found on any beach in the Pacific Northwest? The answer, many will be astonished to discover, is seaweed.
An important food source in Asia for centuries, seaweed is increasingly used in the West for industrial and scientific chemicals, plant fertilizers and livestock feed supplements.
Scientists are also just beginning to explore the medicinal value of seaweeds; the powerful nutrients in these amazing plants have been used to treat hypertension (high blood pressure), some cancers and strokes.
With line drawings and vivid colour photographs, this easy-to-use book thoroughly documents every aspect of seaweed life, from species identification and seaweed biology to the essential - and often surprising - roles seaweed plays in the marine ecosystem and our everyday lives.
Clear and informative, and packed with comprehensive scientific information, interesting facts, further readings and even an assortment of tasty seaweed recipes, this unique and highly readable guidebook will appeal to marine biologists, amateur beachcombers and everyone in between.
An important food source in Asia for centuries, seaweed is increasingly used in the West for industrial and scientific chemicals, plant fertilizers and livestock feed supplements.
Scientists are also just beginning to explore the medicinal value of seaweeds; the powerful nutrients in these amazing plants have been used to treat hypertension (high blood pressure), some cancers and strokes.
With line drawings and vivid colour photographs, this easy-to-use book thoroughly documents every aspect of seaweed life, from species identification and seaweed biology to the essential - and often surprising - roles seaweed plays in the marine ecosystem and our everyday lives.
Clear and informative, and packed with comprehensive scientific information, interesting facts, further readings and even an assortment of tasty seaweed recipes, this unique and highly readable guidebook will appeal to marine biologists, amateur beachcombers and everyone in between.
192 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 2001
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
July 3, 2021
Of the three seaweed identification books I own, this one strikes the best balance between being useful and being pretty. Pacific Seaweeds does not have all the 700+ species known to exist along the Pacific coast. It will not teach you the finer points of differentiation between, oh, a Cryptopleura and a Hymenena species. But it covers the common species, is sensibly organized for the interested but inexperienced tide pool walker, includes excellent full color photos that highlight diagnostic traits, and is just an all round pleasure to flip through.
I'm quickly discovering that each set of tide pools has its own distinctive macroalgal community. Up north, at Palmer's Point, chain bladder kelp and sea sacs were much more dominant than at tide pools in the central coast area. And even within San Mateo County, Fitzgerald Marine Reserve had much more turkish towel and red sea lace than a bit further south at Pigeon Point, where sea palms and bleach weed were common. Seaweed identification is not for the faint of heart, but I found Pacific Seaweeds (along with the iNaturalist app, which uses photo matching algorithms to suggest species) to be one of the more helpful resources in trying to put names to forms.
The book is organized into green, red, and brown seaweeds, which reflects their evolutionary distance from each other. Despite all being photosynthetic multicellular organisms that grow in the sea, these groups are not at all closely related and are different down to their tissue structure and photosynthetic pigments. The non-calcified red algae have special tissue connections that make them somewhat elastic (the book calls this the 'boing-boing test'), which can help distinguish between red seaweeds that look greenish or brownish and the true green and brown seaweeds. Within each section, species are categorized by form (e.g. simple blade, filament, branched in one plane and flattened).
Photos are well chosen and do a good job of capturing the gestalt of a seaweed, at least of the species I saw in real life. The text is unexpectedly sprightly, full of interesting tidbits and useful practical ID tips ('note the sausage like constrictions'). Terminology is kept to a minimum. There's also good info on the weird life cycles of these species - some undergo an alternation of generations so extreme that people thought the two forms were different species - and ocean ecology. Even some recipes! It's like going tide pooling with your very own extremely nerdy, extremely cool phycologist friend.
Not surprisingly, I wasn't able to identify all my seaweeds with this book (again, 700+ species and lots of variation from location to location). But for the past couple weeks, I've had Pacific Seaweeds by my bed so I can flip through it before I go to sleep, and I'm still enjoying it. Way better photos and more helpful tips than the Mondragon book Seaweeds of the Pacific Coast, way more user friendly than Marine Algae of California, which remains way above my head. If you have just one Pacific seaweed book, go for this one.
I'm quickly discovering that each set of tide pools has its own distinctive macroalgal community. Up north, at Palmer's Point, chain bladder kelp and sea sacs were much more dominant than at tide pools in the central coast area. And even within San Mateo County, Fitzgerald Marine Reserve had much more turkish towel and red sea lace than a bit further south at Pigeon Point, where sea palms and bleach weed were common. Seaweed identification is not for the faint of heart, but I found Pacific Seaweeds (along with the iNaturalist app, which uses photo matching algorithms to suggest species) to be one of the more helpful resources in trying to put names to forms.
The book is organized into green, red, and brown seaweeds, which reflects their evolutionary distance from each other. Despite all being photosynthetic multicellular organisms that grow in the sea, these groups are not at all closely related and are different down to their tissue structure and photosynthetic pigments. The non-calcified red algae have special tissue connections that make them somewhat elastic (the book calls this the 'boing-boing test'), which can help distinguish between red seaweeds that look greenish or brownish and the true green and brown seaweeds. Within each section, species are categorized by form (e.g. simple blade, filament, branched in one plane and flattened).
Photos are well chosen and do a good job of capturing the gestalt of a seaweed, at least of the species I saw in real life. The text is unexpectedly sprightly, full of interesting tidbits and useful practical ID tips ('note the sausage like constrictions'). Terminology is kept to a minimum. There's also good info on the weird life cycles of these species - some undergo an alternation of generations so extreme that people thought the two forms were different species - and ocean ecology. Even some recipes! It's like going tide pooling with your very own extremely nerdy, extremely cool phycologist friend.
Not surprisingly, I wasn't able to identify all my seaweeds with this book (again, 700+ species and lots of variation from location to location). But for the past couple weeks, I've had Pacific Seaweeds by my bed so I can flip through it before I go to sleep, and I'm still enjoying it. Way better photos and more helpful tips than the Mondragon book Seaweeds of the Pacific Coast, way more user friendly than Marine Algae of California, which remains way above my head. If you have just one Pacific seaweed book, go for this one.
June 22, 2021
A good guidebook for, well, what it says: all the cold-water seaweeds (aka marine algae), from Alaska to northern Baja. Author Druehl says he really wanted to be a rancher, but: no ranch! So he went to college, discovered he liked marine biology (and the Adriatic!). He's now (2020) a professor emeritus of marine biology at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia: http://www.sfu.ca/biology/faculty/dru...
Seaweeds are HARD, even for the professionals. Plant life started in the oceans, perhaps 1.7 billion years ago, maybe even earlier: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algae For example, over 7,000 species are currently described for the red algae. This "division," whose taxonomy is disputed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_alg... --has unusual features such as pit connections and pit plugs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_alg... -- which I'd never even heard of until I opened this article. These are "unique and distinctive features of red algae that form during the process of cytokinesis following mitosis." Got that? No? Then you're not a marine botanist! Me, neither.
Still, plants have the BIG advantage for the amateur naturalist: they don't run away! They share this characteristic with rocks: one reason I became a geologist. But I think it's easier to make a living in geology.
OK, back to the algae. My wife & I moved to the coast, and decided to learn about sea stuff (we moved here from NM & AZ). We happened to see an exhibit by the seaweed artist Josie Iselin. She had a touring exhibit of large-size photos from her book "An Ocean Garden: The Secret Life of Seaweed." Very cool photos, the author is enthusiastic & charming, and her book is first-rate: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
So, she told us how she made her "photos" -- they are actually scans, from a flat-bed scanner! Must be hard on the scanner: salt water & electronics don't mix, and seaweed doesn't tolerate fresh.
Anyway, she worked out a technique, and got to know a marine botanist at UCB, who helped with IDs, and gave her access to UCBs large collnection of pressed specimens. Anyway, she suggested making your own collxn of local finds for later ID, keeping them in the fridge. Well, dear reader, perhaps this would be good advice for better-organized (less slothful?) amateur naturalists. We did do a few IDs, and then our collxn sat, and sat, and sat.... Good thing we had them in Ziplocs, so when they turned to black slime -- well, they were still messy & disgusting, but *confined*. Since I'm the designated dealer-with-messes, I had to convey them to the trash. Amazingly, all the bags stayed intact! So that was the end of our personal seaweed ID ref collxn. And we quickly discovered, if you don't regularly refresh your memory, all this wonderful new knowledge fades, fades away....
So. You should definitely try seaweed ID, especially if you live near the coast. Just don't expect to retain your newfound knowledge without regular reinforcement!
Seaweeds are HARD, even for the professionals. Plant life started in the oceans, perhaps 1.7 billion years ago, maybe even earlier: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algae For example, over 7,000 species are currently described for the red algae. This "division," whose taxonomy is disputed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_alg... --has unusual features such as pit connections and pit plugs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_alg... -- which I'd never even heard of until I opened this article. These are "unique and distinctive features of red algae that form during the process of cytokinesis following mitosis." Got that? No? Then you're not a marine botanist! Me, neither.
Still, plants have the BIG advantage for the amateur naturalist: they don't run away! They share this characteristic with rocks: one reason I became a geologist. But I think it's easier to make a living in geology.
OK, back to the algae. My wife & I moved to the coast, and decided to learn about sea stuff (we moved here from NM & AZ). We happened to see an exhibit by the seaweed artist Josie Iselin. She had a touring exhibit of large-size photos from her book "An Ocean Garden: The Secret Life of Seaweed." Very cool photos, the author is enthusiastic & charming, and her book is first-rate: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
So, she told us how she made her "photos" -- they are actually scans, from a flat-bed scanner! Must be hard on the scanner: salt water & electronics don't mix, and seaweed doesn't tolerate fresh.
Anyway, she worked out a technique, and got to know a marine botanist at UCB, who helped with IDs, and gave her access to UCBs large collnection of pressed specimens. Anyway, she suggested making your own collxn of local finds for later ID, keeping them in the fridge. Well, dear reader, perhaps this would be good advice for better-organized (less slothful?) amateur naturalists. We did do a few IDs, and then our collxn sat, and sat, and sat.... Good thing we had them in Ziplocs, so when they turned to black slime -- well, they were still messy & disgusting, but *confined*. Since I'm the designated dealer-with-messes, I had to convey them to the trash. Amazingly, all the bags stayed intact! So that was the end of our personal seaweed ID ref collxn. And we quickly discovered, if you don't regularly refresh your memory, all this wonderful new knowledge fades, fades away....
So. You should definitely try seaweed ID, especially if you live near the coast. Just don't expect to retain your newfound knowledge without regular reinforcement!
March 18, 2018
A rare field guide that is as enjoyable to read as it is useful as a reference. It is one thing to be able to look up what something you find on the shore is; it's quite another thing to do that and come away with a little story, aside, snippet, or bit of context to make that knowledge stick. I know a lot more about seaweeds than I would otherwise, were the writing not so enjoyable.
October 27, 2025
MILK = Man I Love Kelp
December 28, 2009
Own it--Excellent reference!
August 16, 2024
what a pleasant read. doesn’t use serial commas, so i can’t give it higher than 4/5. with run-on sentences, they’re a necessity for pacing. the 18th century printing press isn’t charging per character anymore, stop this nonsense.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews