Marine Plants in the Vicinity of 
the Institut Oceanographique de Nha Trang, Viet Nam^ 
E. Yale Dawson^ 
The Institut Oceanographique de Nha 
Trang is situated at 12° north latitude on the 
western shore of the South China Sea. Its 
splendid physical plant, its magnificent loca- 
tion in the midst of the biological wealth of 
Nha Trang Bay, and, not the least, the com- 
fortable climate of Nha Trang make it the 
finest marine laboratory currently operating 
in southeastern Asia. Its recent rehabilitation 
after a period of decline and temporary aban- 
donment during World War II has made its 
exceptional field research facilities available to 
visiting scientists for the first time in many 
years. It was my privilege during early 1953 
to enjoy the use of these facilities for a period 
of nearly 3 months.^ 
The long coast of Viet Nam has been one 
of the most neglected regions of the world 
in the field of algology. The literature con- 
tains records of less than a score of species 
from the entire coast, most of these listed 
nearly a century ago by von Martens (1866). 
Our knowledge of the algae of the west side 
of the South China Sea has consisted largely 
of the works of Tseng on Hainan Island and 
Hong Kong, together with Setchell’s studies 
of Hong Kong sargassums. These papers rep- 
^ Contribution No. 118 from the Allan Hancock 
Foundation. Manuscript received September 30, 1953. 
2 Associate Professor of Biology in the Allan Han- 
cock Foundation, University of Southern California, 
Los Angeles, 
^ These studies were aided by a contract between 
the Office of Naval Research, Department of the Navy, 
and the National Academy of Sciences (NR 106 175). 
resent only fragments of the whole marine 
flora and deal with areas well north of that 
now under consideration. Accordingly, it has 
been necessary to search practically the entire 
literature on tropical and subtropical marine 
algae in an effort to identify the plants of Nha 
Trang. It will be left to future investigators 
to judge the relative success of this explora- 
tory effort. 
Inasmuch as the facilities of the Institut 
Oceanographique will doubtless be used in 
the future by zoologists of diverse specialties, 
many of them interested in organisms de- 
pending directly upon the algae for food, 
attachment, or protection, it is felt that the 
present account should be made as useful to 
that group of students as possible. Hence, 
an illustration has been provided for each 
species, drawn from the local specimens un- 
less otherwise indicated. Artificial keys to the 
genera and species are also presented as an 
aid to identifications. For the most part, de- 
scriptions are limited to comments which, in 
addition to the illustrations and keys, may be 
necessary for identification purposes. Con- 
troversial problems of nomenclature have 
purposely been avoided, but the most ap- 
plicable taxonomic literature has been cited 
for each species as an aid to future students 
of algae in the region. Following the citation 
of the original description, the type locality 
or region is indicated in parentheses. 
In order that these future investigators may 
be enabled to determine what plant I have 
