March 31, 191 1 35 



sionil taxonomist will not find in ii allot' the subdivisions ol 



ra and species that he might wish, but it is thought that 

 tin's will make it more serviceable to the- general user, and that 

 it presents an adequate ac :ount of tin- flora from the more con- 

 Fervat ive viewpoint." 



Many of our active workers no doubt consider the hook to.. 

 conservative, and when we consider that Professor Nelson's writ- 

 ings heretofore could hardly he classed as conservative, the treat- 

 ment of the plants found within the range of the book comes as 

 a distinct surprise. To an active field worker, whose experience 

 has been that we usually have more distinct species than our 

 hooks provide for, the total of 2733 accepted species looks too 

 small and the 1788 synonyms too large for such an extensive 

 area, with its vastly different conditions, as governed l>v alti- 

 tude, mi isture, and all those things which contribute to the 

 differentiation of plant structure. 



The summary in Rydberg's Flora of Colorado gives a total 

 of 2912 species, a greater number by 179 for this one state alone 

 than is found in the whole area covered by the new manual. 

 There are species in New Mexico, in Arizona, in Utah, in Wyo- 

 ming, in the Yellowstone Paik, in Idaho, in Montana and in 

 South Dakota, that are not found in Colorado. Opening the 

 hook at random, I find in the genus Mitsineoii that three of the 

 five species are not credited to Colorado. Were all of these 

 extralimital species searched out, the comparison would he still 

 more at variance. Granted that Rydberg's Flora contains too 

 many species, it does not seem possible that s.ich a great dis- 

 crepancy should exist. 



Should the hook 1 e too conservative, the fact will he brought 

 out by those who have occasion to use it in determining plants 

 which occur within the range, and I leave it for them to give 1 

 definite opinion oil the subject. 



From my own knowledge of the genus Litpinns^ 1 can point 

 out one error. Lupinus aditneus Greene, is not a synonym ol 

 /.. Kingii^ for it is a perennial, while the latter is an annual, 

 belonging to the subgenus Platvearpos. Watson, however, 

 scribed it as a perennid 1 , and is cliiefh responsible fo: an\ e >a- 



