Grab a guide to going bush - or to designing gardens

* A Field Guide to Native Edible Plants of New Zealand
By Andrew Crowe

Penguin $29.95


* Pick Of The Bunch, New Zealand Wildflowers

By Peter Johnson

Longacre Press $49.95


*The New Zealand Pleasure Garden

By Beatrice Hale

Longacre Press, $29.95


The weather may not be tempting for tramping or gardening at this time of year but when summer finally rolls around anybody going bush could do worse than take two of these books with them.

A Field Guide to Native Edible Plants of New Zealand is a good start for planning and preparing a bush feast.

Crowe's interest began over 30 years ago when he was on the East Cape, hungry and a long way from a dairy. He resisted the urge on that occasion but it piqued his interest. A while later he decided to spend 10 days in the Coromandel Ranges, eating just the native plants he could find.

When he emerged he had lost some weight and gained a keen appetite, along with a "new sense of ease and intimacy" with the bush. Further research followed and the result is an information-packed guide to native plant eating.

His book is divided into sections on trees and shrubs, herbs, ferns, mushrooms and seaweeds. And he warns that while there are many things to feast on in the bush, it is still important people take emergency rations.

Hear, hear. I can't imagine tramping without chocolate and suggestions like ear fungus mushrooms don't sound that tempting.

Crowe describes almost 200 plants which can be eaten, accompanying each with a line drawing, description, likely location, and suggestions for use. The drawings are very good but personally I would feel more comfortable identifying potential poisonous plants by photographs.

There are some in the book - more than 120 in fact - but not of every plant. This third edition of Crowe's book tells you that flax nectar can be used as a sweetener, pohutakawa nectar is good for sore throats and basket fungi is good roasted.

The author has written over 30 natural history books and has a new one, Life-Size Guide to New Zealand Ferns, out this month.

More pictures but less nutrition is on offer in Peter Johnson's Pick of the Bunch, New Zealand Wildflowers.

Over 10 years of research is behind the book which is packed full of sharp, colourful photos.

Again, a reprint of a popular classic, Johnson takes you on a journey starting in his Otago back garden and moving up and down the country.

Maps and guides to specific locations make the book a useful one to throw in the car, not leave on the coffee table.

It's quite inspirational, the way he finds pretty little flowers in the most unlikely sites - cemeteries, roadsides, seashores.

To complete a gardening trifecta there's Beatrice Hale's The New Zealand Pleasure Garden, Gardening for the Senses. Again it's a practical guide - aimed at plants that satisfy with their fragrance, texture, colour and shape - and another one for gardening enthusiasts.

It is packed with enough information to create a garden of a desired shape or smell.

A lack of colour pictures will probably limit the appeal of the book but it will attract people who already know plants and want guidance on planning and design.