F. Raymond Fosberg

New and noteworthy plants from Great Barrier Reef sand cays, Australia

Observations are presented on new and critical plants from the northern sand cays on the Great Barrier Reef, Queensland, Australia, based mainly on recent collections made by David R. Stoddart and Ralf Buckley. New species and varieties are described:Lepturus stoddartii (Poaceae),Boerhavia fistulosa var.fistulosa and var.puberuliflora (Nyctaginaceae),Boerhavia albiflora var.heronensis, Spermacoce everistiana (Rubiaceae), andSpermacoce buckleyi; a new combination is made:Diospyros ferrea var.compacta (R. Br.) (Ebenaceae); and additional taxonomic notes are given onBoerhavia, Euphorbia (Euphorbiaceae), andAbutilon (Malvaceae).

A Contribution Toward a World Program in Tropical Biology

Fig. 2. Fort Amador and Bay of Panama, on outskirts of Panama City, where the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute has facilities for research in marine biology. By comparison with North Temperate Zones, knowledge of biology in the tropics is in an incipient stage, yet this region seems to hold greater promise for the emergence of new biological principles and concepts than any other. With this thought in mind, 60 scientists from the United States and Latin America met for a Conference on Tropical Biology,1 in Panama, November 10-12, 1966, and urged the Smithsonian Institution to use its unique attributes to lead in the development of a world program in tropical biology. Such a program is relevant to the International Biological Programme theme of broadening the productivity base for human populations. In 1965 approximately 1.1 billion people (1/3 of the world population) made their home in about 70 sovereign nations in the worlds tropics. Despite the natural richness in variety of species and the high rate of conversion of solar energy to plant and animal life, tropical ecosystems (living communities, including man, and their total environments considered as functional wholes) are readily destroyed through overexploitation by man. Degradation of most tropical ecosystems is now a world concern, since all nations are ultimately affected. Soil erosion on overgrazed savannas in Kenya and bedrock washing of steep mountain slopes denuded of tropical forests in Ecuador illustrate the deterioration of environments under the pressure of expanding human populations. The most urgent world problem today is the establishment of harmonious relationships between human

The Future of Island Vegetation

The vegetation survey of the nine island regions outlined in this book cannot give a quick answer to the question, “What is the future of island vegetation?” As pointed out repeatedly in this book, vegetation is a hierarchical phenomenon.

Northern Polynesia: The Hawaiian Islands

The Hawaiian Islands are the most isolated archipelago in the world. They are 3,765 km from the nearest continental land mass, North America, and 3,350 km from the Marquesas, the nearest archipelago of high islands. At least partly as the result of this isolation, the native flora of flowering plants of these islands is 96% endemic (St. John 1973; or 89%, according to a more recent estimate by Wagner et al. 1990). Thus, the composition of the vegetation is unique. This means that the plant associations in the vegetation are also unique. Over a hundred of these have been described for the Hawaiian Islands by Gagne and Cuddihy (1990). At the formation level the distinctness is much less obvious, as structure and function, the two critical attributes of vegetation formations, appear to be almost independent of composition. However, a significant interdependency has been discovered for the Hawaiian rain forest. This will be explained in the concluding chapter.

The Oceanic Islands in the Eastern Pacific

There are four small oceanic archipelagoes and three isolated islands in the Eastem Pacific off the American coast. These scarcely form a natural geographic region, but they have certain aspects in common. We divide them into a northern and southern subregion. Included in the northern subregion are the Revillagigedo Islands; the three isolated islands Clipperton, Cocos, and Malpelo; and the Galapagos Islands (Fig. 10.1). In the southern subregion are the Desventuradas Islands, with San Felix and San Ambrosio, and the Juan Fernandez Islands, with Alejandro Selkirk (Masafuera), Robinson Crusoe (Masatierra), and Santa Clara Islands (Fig. 10.2). All are considered oceanic in nature, and their floristic relations are almost all American.

The Subtropical Islands in the New Zealand Region

South of Eastern Melanesia, in the subtropical realm of the New Zealand region, are three widely dispersed island groups, Lord Howe, Norfolk, and the Kermadec Islands (Fig. 4.1). The islands of Lord Howe and Norfolk, which are 1350 km and 960 km, respectively, northwest of New Zealand’s North Island, are Pliocene, volcanic islands perched on submarine ridges. These ridges are submerged fragments of the former Gondwana continent. Until the early 1970s, biologists considered these islands to be continental in origin (Raven and Axelrod 1972). Because of their recent emergence in apparent isolation from larger land masses, however, they must be regarded as oceanic islands. The Kermadec Islands are still more recent (Pleistocene-Holocene) volcanic islands arising from a volcanically active submarine ridge along the Andesite Line. This ridge is formed by the Kermadec-Tonga Trench, where the oceanic Pacific Plate overrides the Indo-Australia Plate (Macdonald et al. 1983). Thus, the Kermadecs are plate boundary islands, while the other two are intraplate islands.

Tributes to Truman G. Yuncker and Ethel Claflin Yuncker

In looking back ove r m y years at DePauw Univers i ty there is one outs tanding lesson I learned f rom the teaching o f Dr. Yuncker and Dr. Welch. This is the value of individual discussion and at tent ion given to the student by the instructor. I have tried to follow this phi losophy o f teaching in m y own work, 30 years of teaching and research at West Virginia Univers i ty . I a m grateful to Drs. Yuncker and Welch for this impor t an t lesson and for setting such a fine example.--HORACE L. BARNETT, Emeri tus Professor of Mycology, Divis ion o f Plant and Soil Sciences, West Virginia Universi ty , 401 Brooks Hall, P.O. Box 6057, Morgantown, WV 26506-6057.

Whither Terrestrial Ecosystems and Habitats

The subtitle of my paper, ‘Preservation of the Habitat of Man’, was chosen to place in sharper focus the general subject of this Conference, as what we are here for essentially is to discuss Man’s future prospects on Earth. His future, if any, depends very largely on his relationships with the environment in which he finds himself, and from which he cannot escape. In this sense, his environment extends throughout at least the inner 100 million miles’ radius of the Solar System, and perhaps farther out. We do not know if light and other radiation from the rest of the Galaxy have any significant effect on Man as a species. Perhaps they do. Starlight has at least a psychological effect; it also enables Man to see in times of darkness, to navigate his ships at sea, and to locate himself precisely on land. So perhaps the Universe is Man’s real environment. In the narrowest possible view, the Sun must be a part of his environment, as he is utterly dependent on its radiant energy.