Remember when plant identification meant hauling around a massive field guide from the 90s?

Now my kid just snaps a photo with an app, and we get an answer in seconds, which is great, but I do miss the quiet struggle of flipping through those heavy, water-stained pages together.

3 comments

3 Comments

alexw751mo ago

Lol, I miss the struggle too. My old guide was so wrong half the time we'd end up arguing over blurry pictures of leaves.

lindamartin1mo ago

Oh man, those blurry leaf pictures were the worst. I'm pretty sure I've won arguments with a guidebook by just being louder and more stubborn.

willow_morgan1mo ago

My 2003 Peterson guide had this awful photo of a sugar maple leaf that looked like a brown blob. I convinced my whole hiking group we'd found some rare oak hybrid because I just kept pointing at the page and saying "see the lobes!" We spent twenty minutes debating before someone pulled out their phone.