BIOLOGICAL SURVEY 



Botanical Field Work 



In the earlier days South Carolina held a distinguished posi- 

 tion in the botanical world; its botanists were among the fore- 

 most America has produced. But since the death of Dr. Henry 

 W. Ravenel, Prof. Lewis R. Gibbes, and Dr. F. Peyre Porcher 

 practically no botanical work had been done by resident South 

 Carolinians. Prof. W. C. Coker, professor of botany in the 

 University of North Carolina, was born in South Carolina and 

 has published the most important papers in recent years on the 

 flora of the state. His Plant Life of Hartsville, S. C is the 

 first careful detailed study of the flora of a limited locality since 

 Ravenel 's paper on the Santee Canal region. Men from the 

 big institutions of the north or from neighboring states have 

 collected here from time to time and have carried away the re- 

 sults of their labor to enrich their own herbaria. Even their 

 published articles are seen by few in the state. It would proba- 

 bly be impossible today to find an herbarium containing any- 

 thing like a complete representation of South Carolina plants, 

 certainly not in South Carolina itself. 



It is due to a realization of these facts that the Charleston Mu- 

 seum has undertaken a plant survey of the state, a survey which 

 will ultimately, it is hoped, show the distribution of all known 

 species within the state, in what herbaria specimens of each 

 species are to be found, and bibliographical data relating to the 

 species. 



This survey was started in 1909 and until the present summer 

 has not extended beyond the coast region. In order to enlarge 

 its scope and to learn personally something of the flora of other 

 parts of the state I have spent the months of July and August 

 and one week of June collecting at Sumter, in the region about 

 Keowee, and at Caesar's Head. During the first half of Au- 

 gust I was across the line in North Carolina, observing and analy- 



iJour. Elisha Mitchell Society, XXVII, 1911, 169-205. 



54 



