Fred Roberts, Jr., is a consulting botanist, artist, and author. He grew up in Dana Point, southern Orange County, where thousands of acres of undeveloped grassland and scrub presented hiking opportunities contributing to a strong interest in natural history. While attending Dana Hills High School he became interested in reptiles, amphibians, birds, and plants. At Saddleback Community College, botany became his primary interest, especially plant species diversity and geography. Jon Little, a professor at Saddleback reviewed his first Orange County checklist and introduced him to the concept of voucher specimens. In 1982, Fred received his Bachelor of Science in Geography with an emphasis on Botany from University of California, Santa Barbara. After he graduated, he worked as an assistant curator in the Museum of Systematic Biology, University of California, Irvine for nine years, followed by seven as a botanist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service before starting his own botanical consulting business. Fred is also a Research associate of the California Botanic Garden. His specialty areas are rare plants of southern California, oaks, and lilies. His other books include "A Checklist of Orange County Flowering Plants" (1st edition 1989, 2nd edition 1998), "Illustrated Guide to the Oaks of the Southern Californian Floristic Province" (1995), "The Vascular Plants of Western Riverside County, California: An Annotated Checklist" (2004), with co-authors, and "The Vascular Plants of Orange County: An Annotated Checklist" (2008). He is currently working on "A Flora of Orange County, California." Several more book projects are in the works. He lives in Oceanside with his wife, Carol, a corgi, and personable two cats.