Author: H. B. Guppy

Publisher: Forgotten Books

Published: 2017-11-04

Total Pages: 678

ISBN-13: 9780260297983

Excerpt from Observations of a Naturalist in the Pacific Between 1896 and 1899, Vol. 2 My interest in plant-dispersal dates back to' 1884, when, whilst surgeon of h.m.s. Lark, in the Solomon Islands, I made some observations on the stocking of a coral island with its plants, which Were published in the Report on fire Botany of Ike Challenger Expedition. In 1888 I followed up the same line of investigation during a sojourn of three months on Keeling Atoll, and during a journey along the coasts of West Java. But realising that as yet I had barely touched the fringe of a great subject, and that several years of study would be required before one could Venture even to appreciate the nature of the problems involved and much less to Weigh results, I took advantage of the circumstances of my life to make, between the years 1890 and 1896, a prolonged investigation of the plants of the British flora, mainly from the standpoint of dispersal by water. This involved the study of the seed-drift of ponds and rivers and of the plants supplying it, a study which brought me into close relation with aquatic and sub aquatic plants. This line of investigation led me into contact with many other aspects of plant-life; and as time went on my field of interest extended to the plants of dry stations and to the bird as an agent in plant-dispersal. Only a few of these results have been published, as in the journals of the Linnean Society and of the Royal Physical Society of Edinburgh as well as in the pages of Science Gossip. They lie for the most part still within my note-books, and fitly so, since I regarded such studies chiefly as a preparation for the investigation of the general question of plant-dispersal. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.