I am afraid I disagree here. Dried plants look different from live ones.
There appears to be no shortage of characters that are easily visible on
live plants but are hard to make out on dried plants. Also a great deal of
the fun goes out of it if only dried plants are handled.

What helps is getting down next to the plant with a good flora and puzzling
out the distinguishing characters (it may help to do this together with
somebody else). Have a hand lens handy. Alternatively a good picture book is
very helpful for a first approximation. Browsing through a well-printed full
color guide is a much happier passtime than making a stack of dried plants.
PvR

PS for those not interested: technically it is so that once a botanical name
has become valid it will remain so forever. The word is "correct" (=
current)

LenoraBell wrote:

Finally my questions:
Can someone recommend to me a good modern book that could teach me some
basic things about botany?

Tom Schweich schreef
Books are OK, but the best way to learn is to work with the plants.
Start by collecting, drying and preparing vouchers for the plants
around you, in your yard, your neighborhood (with permission) and your
county, and work out your own descriptions of the characters. Then
compare to your books. Collect the same plant many times from different
locations and mount them side by side, so you can begin to see the
natural variation within a species. You'll find out how even "evenly
pinnate" really is. Also volunteer at your local university herbarium
to mount their backlog, file, etc. Over time, you'll find that working
with the plants is much more effective than reading about them.

See: http://www.mobot.org/MOBOT/molib/fie.../welcome.shtml

--

--
Tom Schweich
http://www.schweich.com Day: 415-545-3644