330 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1949 
Each seems a separate unit and the visitor with limited time tends to 
pass over the introductions. There are, however, so many interesting 
and important botanical features in both floras that neither should 
be omitted. 
THE NATIVE FLORA 
The indigenous flora of New Zealand is among the most distinctive 
of the world’s floras. It is not especially rich in number of species, 
Cheeseman’s Manual (4) listing only 1,763 species, but it contains a 
wealth of fascinating members, mostly belonging to genera and families 
unfamiliar to the traveler from northern lands. About 78 percent of 
the indigenous species of ferns and seed plants are endemics, that is, 
are not found anywhere else in the world. This becomes 88 percent 
if the ferns and monocotyledonous plants are excluded, and even 
higher if only the forest species are considered. Forty genera are 
found only in New Zealand. Among the more conspicuous or signifi- 
cant are the lacewood (Hoheria—Malvaceae), one of the few natives 
which has conspicuous and ornamental flowers and is deciduous, and 
two composite genera, Haastia and Raoulia, which form the ‘‘ vegetable 
sheep” (pl. 3, fig. 2, and pl. 10, fig. 1), for which New Zealand is noted. 
The reasons for the occurrence of these species and genera only in 
New Zealand are mostly obscure, and leave much yet to learn. They 
may have evolved here or they may have had a widespread distribu- 
tion and have died out elsewhere. It cannot readily be determined 
that these represent a flora which developed in New Zealand, rather 
than one that came from some other part of the world in remote 
geological times, but the evidence is that such flora did evolve here. 
It is called the palaeozelandic flora and certain genera are tentatively 
assumed to belong to it. They include the three strictly endemic 
genera just mentioned, besides others now found elsewhere but which 
probably originated here. Among them are the distinctive New 
Zealand pine (Dacrydium) in the Taxaceae, the New Zealand broom 
(Carmichaelia—Leguminosae), the widespread shrub Coprosma (Rubi- 
aceae) of distinctive divaricating habit and many species, and the 
woody genus Hebe (Scrophulariaceae), which is often combined with 
the widespread genus Veronica with mostly herbaceous species. 
The majority of the nonendemic species and genera are found also in 
Australia. One might suppose this indicated a relation between the 
floras of the two regions, but too much emphasis should not be given 
to this numerical superiority of the Australian element. It is just as 
important in considering this relationship that certain prominent 
Australian groups do not occur in New Zealand. Thus in these 
islands there are no native eucalypts (Hucalyptus—Myrtaceae), bottle- 
brushes (Callistemon—Myrtaceae), Melaleuca (Myrtaceae), wattles 
(Acacia—Leguminosae), and other significant genera, especially 
