Report on the Flora of Pingelap Atoll, Caroline Islands, Micronesia, and 
Observations on the Vocabulary of the Native Inhabitants: 
Pacific Plant Studies 7 1 
Harold St. John 2 
INTRODUCTION 
The scientific literature concerning the bot¬ 
any of the Caroline Islands, Micronesia, is al¬ 
ready of considerable extent. It includes check 
lists and ecological accounts of most of the high 
islands, a check list of Micronesia, and a floris- 
tic treatment of the woody plants. In the Caro¬ 
line Islands only five island groups contain high 
islands. These are Palau, Yap, Truk, Ponape, 
and Kusaie. They have extensive floras, and as is 
natural, these have received the most intensive 
botanical investigation. 
The atolls and low coral islands are much 
more numerous in the Carolines than are the 
high islands. These single coral islands or island 
clusters are 43 in number. Strange as it appears, 
no detailed report has been published on the 
flora of any one of these low islands. During 
the Christmas period of 1945 the writer led a 
four-man mission from the University of Hawaii 
on a 3 weeks’ scientific reconnaissance of Micro¬ 
nesia. It was made possible by the courtesy and 
assistance of the United States Navy, which pro¬ 
vided transportation by airplane and ship, and 
other facilities. 
While returning from Kusaie to Ponape on 
board the navy vessel LCI 567, it was possible 
to make a brief stop on December 27, 1945, at 
Pingelap Atoll, which lies about halfway be¬ 
tween the two larger islands. It was stormy 
1 This is the seventh of a series of papers designed 
to present descriptions, revisions, or records of Pacific 
island plants. The preceding papers were published 
as: Bernice P. Bishop MmOccas. Papers 17(7), 
1942; 17(13), 1943; 18(5), 1945; Amer. Pern Jour. 
35* 87-89, 1945; Toney Bot. Club, Bui 73: 588, 
1946; Pacific Sci. 1: 116-118, 1947. 
2 Chairman, Department of Botany, University of 
Hawaii. Manuscript received September 5, 1947. 
during the night voyage, and this bad weather 
delayed the landfall from dawn to midmorning. 
The sky was murky and one rain squall after 
another drove across the sea, greatly reducing 
visibility. Nevertheless, the miraculous radar 
enabled the navigators to pick up and locate the 
island and approach with assurance, till it 
loomed up a mile ahead as a low dark line on the 
gray sea. Circling the south end the vessel ap¬ 
proached and lay to off the western shore of the 
larger and southernmost islet, Pingelap Island, 
just opposite the single village. 
Ready and eager to get ashore, the writer 
climbed down a rope ladder and dropped into 
the first boat to come alongside. It was a trim 
and slim two-man outrigger canoe. It was large 
enough so that even with an extra passenger 
there were still several inches of freeboard, and 
the trip to the shore was made without bailing. 
The reef was a shelving one, extending far out, 
but submerged enough so that the canoe easily 
floated all the way to the beach. Of the two 
paddlers, the one in charge was a sturdy, elderly, 
white-haired man named Soas. Both were eager 
for the cigarettes offered them, but the driving 
rain prevented their being lighted. 
Our ship was the second to visit the island in 
4 years. Three months before, a United States 
Navy ship had repatriated some seventy-five of 
the men who had been working for the Japanese 
armed forces as forced agricultural laborers on 
the plantations on Ponape. They returned in 
want of new clothing and goods, to find their 
families and neighbors in similar need. Many 
men, women, and youths had for clothes only 
a few ragged bits of cloth. The most needy were 
clothed in girdles of leaves. Soas appeared with 
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