680 
The Plant Exploring Expedition to Brazil. 
Heretofore the Agricultural Explorers of the office 
have gone out singly. With the departure of Mr. P. H. 
Dorsett, Plant Introducer of this Office, Mr. A. D. 
Shamel, Physiologist of the Office of Pomological and 
Horticultural Investigations, and Mr. Wilson Popenoe, 
Agricultural Explorer of this office, a new policy has 
been inaugurated; that of sending out an expedition of men 
who supplement each other and can work together in the in- 
vestigation of any new plant introduction problem which 
may present itself. 
The time required and the large amounts of capital 
involved in the establishment of a new agricultural indus- 
try, make it seem imperative in the future, that the 
first investigation of any foreign plant culture should be 
more thorough than it is possible for one man travelling 
alone to make, burdened as he necessarily is with all the 
details of travel. 
Through the hearty cooperation of Mr. Stubenrauch, in 
charge of the Office of Pomological and Horticultural In- 
vestigations, it has been possible to organize this ex- 
pedition and send as a most important member of it Mr. A. 
D. Shamel, the Physiologist of that office, who is without 
doubt the best equipped man in the world to study the 
Navel orange industry of southern Brazil. 
Mr. Shamel 's remarkable discovery that there are at 
least nine distinct strains or types of the Bahia Navel 
orange represented in the California orchards has raised 
the question as to whether or not Mr. William Saunders' 
importation in 1870 brought in the best Navel in ex- 
istence at Bahia and whether this remarkable variety has 
varied in Bahia as it has in California. The investiga- 
tions of Dr. Lounsbury of Cape Town some years ago re- 
vealed the fact that the Bahia Navel orange growers recog- 
nize two types of Seville orange stocks and that one is 
superior to the other. 
It is hoped that Mr. Shamel, with the assistance of 
the other members of the expedition will be able to make 
a thorough investigation of the matter. So little is 
known of the plant resources of this great unexplored area 
of Southern Brazil, .that the expedition may be expected to 
discover new forms of valuable plants which are not in the 
literature. The high plateaus visited by occasional 
frosts , and the borders of the large arid regions sur- 
rounded by sub-tropical forests are habitats where forms 
are likely to be found which will be subject to acclima- 
tization in our Southern States. 
