C. H. Ostenfeld: Contributions to West Australian Botany. II. 3 



nearly a year in the most interesting part of the tropical W. A. 

 for zoological and ethnographical studies and travelled far into 

 the interior, did not have a professional botanist with him. — 



No doubt the botanical exploring of the tropical part of W. A. 

 — often called "The Nor'west" — would be an interesting and 

 paying object for a scientist who could afford to devote some 

 time (perhaps a year) to it, and could stand the climate. My 

 own flying visits at different places along the coast, made when 

 the steamer stopped for taking in cargo, gave me the impression 

 that a study of the vegetation would raise many interesting pro- 

 blems both with regard to flora, plant-geography and ecology. 



It goes without saying that what I could do during such 

 short time and only in the immediate surroundings of the regu- 

 lar stopping places for the steamer, was not much. Still I find 

 it worth publishing, as we know so very little from this part of 

 West Australia, and in the following I shall give some descrip- 

 tions — I admit only very incomplete — of the vegetation of 

 the coast region, and further enumerate the species collected. 1 



I visited this part of W. A. in the first days of November 

 1914 and called at the following places (north of the Capricorn): 

 off Onslow (Nov. 1st), Point Samson, near Cossack (Nov. 2nd), 

 Port Hedland (Nov. 3rd-4th), Broome (Nov. 5th) and Derby, King 

 Sound (Nov. 6th-7th). 



I. Some general Remarks on the Vegetation. 



The tropical part of W. A. is a part of the immense plateau, 

 of which nearly the whole western half of Australia consists. 2 

 But the surface is not as even or undulating as farther south. 

 We find real mountain landscapes both towards North-west, where 

 Mount Bruce, the highest point of W. A., rises to a height of 

 1226 m, and towards North (the Kimberley division), the highest 

 point of which is Mount Hann (850 m). In both these regions 

 the coast is more or less indented and provided with islands, and 



1 It would have been interesting to compile a list of the flora of the 

 tropical W. A., but from what is said above it seems evident that it is 

 not possible to solve this matter, many of the records of the floras 

 and lists being too indistinct as regards their geographical positions. 



2 Jutson, L. T.: An Outline of the Physiographical Geology (Physiography) 

 of Western Australia. Geol. Surv. Bull. No. 61. Perth, 1914. 



1* 



