UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

MISCELLANEOUS PUBLICATION NO. 401

Washington, D. C.

Issued June 1942

GEOGRAPHICAL GUIDE

to

FLORAS OF THE WORLD

An annotated list with special reference to useful plants

and common plant names

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, Washington, D. C.

Price 75 cents

FLORAS OF THE WORLD

An annotated selected list of floras and floristic works relating to

vascular plants, including bibliographies and publications dealing

with useful plants and vernacular names.

Part I

Africa, Australasia, Insular Floras, North America, and

South America

By S. F. BLAKE, senior botanist, Division of Plant Exploration and Introduction,

Bureau of Plant Industry, and ALICE C. ATWOOD, botanical bibliographer,

Library1

1 The authors wish to express their thanks to the authorities and librarians of the
Gray Herbarium, the Arnold Arboretum, and the New York Botanical Garden for per-
mission to consult their libraries freely. Several botanists have examined the lists of
titles of regions with which they are familiar and have suggested additional papers.
Dr. John Hendley Barnhart, of the New York Botanical Garden, has rendered much
assistance by furnishing full names and dates of some authors from his extensive card
catalog of botanists, now including about 35,000 cards.

1

INTRODUCTION

The primary purpose of this publication is usefulness, not bibliographical completeness. Its aim is to furnish an annotated catalog of all the now useful floras and floristic works, including those in periodical literature, that list or describe the complete vascular flora (or the phanerogams only) of any region or locality, and to include as well all publications dealing on the same scale with useful and medicinal plants, vernacular names, and botanical bibliography. In general, only the later works relating to a given region or subject are included, although earlier publications are usually mentioned under the titles of works that have replaced them. Publications dealing with only a part of the flora, such as a single family or larger group of the flowering plants or the pteridophytes only, or a single group of useful plants, such as those producing dyes, resins, or forage, are excluded, except for complete papers on edible, medicinal, or woody plants. Occasional titles relating to weeds and poisonous plants, chiefly from the botanical point of view, have been included, although no attempt has been made to include all papers on these subjects. In the case of little-known regions without complete floras, some publications of an incomplete nature, such as lists of species obtained by individual collectors or expeditions, have been inserted, as have also some miscellaneous papers not falling strictly within the scope of the list as defined. In general, no attempt has been made to evaluate the titles listed, but references to critical reviews are given when available. Papers that are primarily ecological have been excluded unless they contain fairly complete lists of the plants of the areas discussed. Works of the "popular" type, intended for beginners in botany, have been omitted, as well as works that are now only of historical value. The list is intended to be complete through 1939, and no later titles have been inserted.

The selective nature of this work has left the authors free to omit a few papers dealing with areas so small that they can be disregarded by all but the local botanist dealing in a very special way with the regions concerned, and also those few lists that are so full of errors or so incomplete that their inclusion would serve no useful purpose. These intentional omissions aside, this publication can be taken as providing an annotated summary of the available nominally complete publications on the vascular flora and the economic botany of the world. Unintentional omissions will, of course, be found by users, and additions will be gratefully received by the authors.

No list of the scope of this one has ever been published. Daydon Jackson's Guide to the Literature of Botany,2 now over 60 years old, dealt almost entirely with independently published works, and its few annotations were mainly bibliographical. A 12-page publication by Prof. G. L. Goodale,3 of about the same date, listed geographically and chronologically the more important independently published

2 JACKSON, B. D. GUIDE TO THE LITERATURE OF BOTANY; BEING A CLASSIFIED SELECTION OF BOTANICAL WORKS, INCLUDING NEARLY 6,000 TITLES NOT GIVEN IN PRITZEL'S THESAURUS. xl, 626 p. 22 cm. London, 1881. (Index Society Publications,_viii.)

3 GOODALE, GEORGE L. THE FLORAS OF DIFFERENT COUNTRIES. Bibl. Contrib. Libr. Harvard Univ. 9. 12 p. 1879. (Reprinted from Bul. Libr. Harvard Univ. no. 10, 11, and 12.)Partly annotated list, geographically grouped, then arranged in chronological order; includes for the most part only separately published works, many of which are now only of historical value. Almost none of the smaller local floras are included.