Camprinar, Massacnuserts, Ocroper 26, 1949 
BOTANICAL MUSEUM LEAFLETS 
HARVARD UNIVERSITY 
PLANTAE COLOMBIANAE XII 
DE PLANTIS PRINCIPALITER AMAZONIAE 
COLOMBIANAE INVESTIGATIONES 
BY 
Ricuarp Evans Scuuutres! 
THE Amazonia of Colombia, vast and, for the most 
part, still unknown, has a surprisingly varied flora. Bo- 
tanical explorations of this northwesternmost part of the 
great Amazon Valley have been pitifully few in relation 
to the size of the area and the wealth of its flora. Colom- 
bia’s Amazon region is divided into the Comisarias of the 
Putumayo, Caqueté, Amazonas and Vaupés. It com- 
prises about 404,000 square kilometers or one-third the 
area of the entire country. It is at once obvious how 
vital to our understanding of the flora of the rest of Co- 
lombia, as well as of the whole Amazon basin, is a clear 
conception of the phytogeographical relationships of the 
vegetation of this immense area. 
In the course of identifying recent collections from the 
Colombian Amazonia, I have found that a number of 
these represent hitherto apparently undescribed concepts 
or concepts previously unknown either from Colombia 
or from its Amazonian regions. It seems advisable to 
publish, from time to time, collected notes of this type 
' Botanist, Bureau of Plant Industry, Soils, and Agricultural Engi- 
neering, Agricultural Research Administration, United States Depart- 
ment of Agriculture; Research Fellow, Botanical Museum, Harvard 
University. 
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