UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF A 



GRICULTURE 



Uy INVENTORY No. 74 



Washington, D. C. ▼ 



Issued June, 1925 



SEEDS AND PLANTS IMPORTED BY THE OFFICE OF FOREIGN SEED AND 

 PLANT INTRODUCTION, BUREAU OF PLANT INDUSTRY, DURING THE 

 PERIOD FROM JANUARY 1 TO MARCH 31, 1923 (S. P. I. NOS. 56145 TO 

 56790) 



CONTENTS 



Page 



Introductory statement 1 



Inventory 5 



Index of common and scientific names 39 



INTRODUCTORY STATEMENT 



THIS INVENTORY contains a record of some unusually rare plants which 

 have been collected by Agricultural Explorer Joseph F. Rock, whose travels 

 in the western part of the Province of Yunnan, China, have been carried on re- 

 gardless of the unsettled conditions in that region. He has been obliged not only 

 to take the usual risks of travel at high altitudes on primitive mountain passes 

 where a misstep might mean instant death, run the usual dangers from infectious 

 diseases, like pneumonic plague and dysentery, and bear the severe nervous strain 

 -of loneliness, but he also has had to keep out of the way of the roving bands of 

 Tibetans and the Chinese soldiers carrying on an almost continuous conflict along 

 "the Tibetan border of Yunnan. 



Collecting dried specimens or taking photographs of plants under such con- 

 ditions requires great skill, an unusual knowledge of oriental languages, and a 

 wide acquaintance with Asiatic plants. When, however, to the collecting of 

 specimens and the taking of photographs is added the gathering and packing of 

 living seeds and plants and getting them alive to America, requiring more than two 

 months by letter post, the nature of the problem which Mr. Rock has had to 

 •solve is more correctly stated. Much of the material gathered on the Likiang 

 Snow Range has had to come by special messenger as letter post over mountain 

 passes at 12,000 feet altitude and be plunged into the torrid humidity of the Ran- 

 goon post office, to remain in that steaming atmosphere until the post bags were 

 finally unloaded in the dry Italian air of Brindisi. To pack cuttings and seeds 

 of high-mountain plants for such a voyage and have them arrive alive in Wash- 

 ington is a tribute to the attention to detail which Mr. Rock has shown, and it 

 is to be hoped that his efforts will be repaid by the large number of species which 

 liave survive! the ordeal and will thrive in this country. 



By one of those fatalities of things, the trees which were most desired from 

 Yunnan, Yunnan chestnuts and species of the related genus Castanopsis, are 

 known to have very short-lived seeds which are particularly hard to transport. 

 Although almost every conceivable method of packing was tried, nearly all the 

 seeds of these genera perished on the way. It is believed, however, that enough 

 lived to establish some of the species in America. 



Mr. Rock's material described in this inventory came mainly from the general 

 Tegion of Likiang, which lies more than 8,000 feet above sea level, near the great 

 mountain range around which the Yangtze River meanders on its way to the 

 Pacific, a region of deep gorges and snow-capped mountain peaks. 



18609— 25t 1 



