RECENT BOTANICAL COLLECTING IN THE 
REPUBLIC OF COLOMBIA 
By Н.Н. Козву 
College of Pharmacy, Columbia University 
There are three reasons why the flora of Colombia is of excep- 
tional interest to students of plant distribution: 
A. This country contains what might be called the “elbow” 
of the Andes mountains; the region where their northern extension 
is exchanged for a broad sweep to the east along the Caribbean Sea. 
B. Soon after entering southern Colombia, the Andes divide 
like the tines of a fork, into three parallel branches. Since these 
three ranges are of very considerable height and a large part of 
their intervening valleys is elevated but little above sea level, 
there results an extreme range of climatic conditions, with a cor- 
responding diversity of flora. 
C. The country yields a number of important drugs, besides 
many other economic products of great interest and value. 
Although the Colombian flora has been much studied, this 
study has been rather fragmentary than general and we have yet 
a great deal to learn regarding the relations between its different 
parts. Among the noted botanists who have studied and collected 
there, are Humboldt, Zea, Mutis, Triana, Karsten, and Caldas, in 
former times. During the eighties, Lehmann collected very ex- 
tensively in the south and west. More recently, many small col- 
lections have been made, especially by American botanists, be- 
sides quite an extensive one by Mr. Herbert Smith, in the vicinity 
of Santa Marta. 
My personal interest in the study of this flora is of a rather ex- 
ceptional character, because of the great amount of work that I 
have done upon the flora of neighboring portions of the Andes. 
In 1885, I made very extensive collections from Peru southward to 
Chile, later traversing the entire length of the Madeira and Amazon 
Valley. Thereafter, I maintained a collector in Bolivia for several 
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