Flora of Yucatan

THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY 580.5 FB Return this book on o; before the Latest Date stamped below. A charge is made on all overdue books. U. of I. NO VI 2 I 1972 5 19J2 OEC 31 1947 20 1348 FEB 25 148 1 2 1953 61 196 G 3 1961 ;& M32 FLORA OF YUCATAN PAUL C. STANDLEY Soon after the organization of Field Museum of Natural History, in 1893, the Curator of the Department of Botany, the late Dr. Charles F. Millspaugh, became interested in the botanical exploration of the Yucatan Peninsula. It would have been difficult to choose a part of tropical America less known botanically or, probably, one which would prove more interesting. Practically nothing was known at that time of the plants inhabiting the limestone plains and low hills of Yucatan. Today we are far from possessing a complete knowl- edge of the Yucatan flora, but what information we do have a very respectable amount, as the ensuing pages will prove is the result almost wholly of the work of two men, Dr. Millspaugh and Dr. George F. Gaumer, performed with the support of Field Museum. Dr. Millspaugh made two visits to Yucatan in order to collect plants. Dr. Gaumer, who died as recently as September 2, 1929, forty-five years in the state, and throughout this time he maintained an interest in natural history. A list of his earliest plant collections, from Cozumel Island, was inserted in the fourth and supplemental volume of Hemsley's Botany of Salvin and Godman's monumental Biologia Centrali-Americana. For years he collected intermittently, but when, through Dr. Millspaugh's igency, his work was financed by Field Museum, he devoted an increased amount of his time to botanical exploration of Yucatan and Quintana Roo. As a result, a huge quantity of specimens was assembled. Some of these were gathered personally by Dr. Gaumer, and others under his supervision by his sons or by native collectors. Dr. Gaumer's botanical activities continued for more than thirty years, until his work was made difficult by physical infirmities resulting from advancing years, about the time of Dr. Millspaugh's death. He collected with some degree of completeness over much of Yucatan and the adjacent portions of Quintana Roo. Of the flora of the southern part of the latter territory, unfortunately, we still know absolutely nothing, except by inference. Dr. Gaumer did more than merely assemble a collection of dried herbarium specimens. Himself a practising physician, he was keenly interested in medicinal properties attributed to the plants by the native people. He gathered assiduously all available data upon the 157 158 FIELD MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY BOTANY, VOL. Ill subject, and himself employed the local plants in treating his pa- tients. His eulogies of the supposed therapeutic properties of certain members of the Yucatan flora, especially when further embellished by Dr. Millspaugh's own somewhat unorthodox medical views, arouse mild amusement. It is scarcely necessary to caution the reader that the medicinal properties ascribed to certain plants in the present flora are to be taken with liberal reservations. It is unfortunate only that it is impossible to determine from the notes at the writer's disposal which of the supposed curative properties of the plants are ascribed to them by the Yucatecans, and which by Dr. Gaumer. The former would have a real interest from a strictly ethnological standpoint. Dr. Gaumer exerted himself, also, to obtain data regarding gen- eral economic applications of the plants, and here he was eminently successful. It is to be regretted that he was not a trained ethnolo- gist, that he might have searched for possible remnants of ritual uses of the plants, or have investigated their place, if any, in folk lore. As is well known, the majority of the present-day Yucatecans speak Maya rather than Spanish, some of them nothing at all of the latter language. Dr. Gaumer devoted a great deal of time to learning the Maya plant names, and his success is indicated by the fact that a Maya name is recorded here for nearly every species. Ralph L. Roys, who has engaged in study of Maya botany, reports that the names recorded by Dr. Gaumer are usually well written, and apparently exact. Some of the notes to which I have had access state that his plan in assembling these names was to show the plants to several Mayas, record the names they gave, and then select the one he considered most apt or appropriate. This method is not to be commended. It would have been preferable to report all the names communicated by the informants, and let the reader make his own selection, perhaps with an indication of the preference of the compiler. If such a complete list had been pre- served, probably it would now be possible to identify some of the perplexing names of the old medical works. It would be unjust to leave the subject of the Gaumer plants without mentioning their handling after receipt in Chicago. The large collections formed by Dr. Gaumer included great numbers of duplicates, especially of his later series. At the time of Dr. Mills- paugh's death, these remained unorganized, along with many duplicates of his earlier years. In many or most cases the data for the FLORA OF YUCATAN 159 numbers had to be sought with the original specimens distributed into the herbarium of Field Museum. Assistant Curator J. Francis Macbride undertook the organization of this imposing mass of duplicates, and to him and to Miss Edith M. Vincent, who assisted in the work, are indebted the herbaria which have received sets of this important series, containing so many endemic or rare species. The immense amount of uninter- esting and tedious labor involved in such a task can be appreciated only by one who, like the present writer, has himself undertaken such a discouraging and thankless task. However, the work finally was brought to an end, and the material all labeled and arranged in sets, most of which have been distributed to the principal herbaria of the United States and Europe. A word of explanation might be offered regarding the quality of some of the material included in the sets as distributed. They con- tained specimens of many common species, because it is of such plants that most floras are chiefly composed. In some instances material of rare or endemic species that had been somewhat damaged by insects was included, since it was believed that most herbaria would prefer to have even an inferior specimen of a rare species rather than no representation at all. The quality of the material of this sort, if it needs any defense or apology, is not the fault of the one who prepared it for distribution. The insect damage had been done before the collection came to his attention, and in preparing the sets for distribution he properly destroyed a vast amount of material badly damaged or representing common weedy species. PREPARATION AND SCOPE OF THE FLORA Dr. Millspaugh's papers upon the flora of Yucatan fill the greater portion of the first two volumes of the Botanical Series of Field Museum, and constitute the first two parts of the third volume, of which the present flora forms the concluding part. In these papers he brought together previously published reports of Yucatan plants, and added the records based upon the collections of Dr. Gaumer and himself, as well as those of the few other collectors who visited the region. It was his intention to publish a complete flora of Yucatan, and a beginning was made in the third volume, with accounts of the ferns, grasses, and sedges. A few drawings were prepared to illus- trate further parts. 160 FIELD MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY BOTANY, VOL. Ill At the time of Dr. Millspaugh's death there had accumulated a large quantity of the Gaumer collections which never had been studied or determined. By the Director of Field Museum the present writer, then at the United States National Museum, was requested to determine the collections and to prepare an enumeration of them. The list here published is the result. The greater part of it was written at the National Museum and during six weeks spent at Field Museum in September and October, 1927. The manuscript has lain almost complete, except for the intro- duction and certain final touches of minor importance, ever since the writer became a member of the staff of Field Museum, in June, 1928. Only a certain innate indolence has delayed its final sub- mission to the printer until the present time. The very large accumulations of Gaumer plants required a long time for their determination. They consisted principally of material gathered from 1917 to 1921, but included also many earlier numbers, fragmentary or otherwise difficult, which never had been identified. Dr. Millspaugh himself in his later papers changed many of his early determinations, and recent systematic work necessitates many other corrections. In the following list an attempt has been made to indicate all published Yucatan reports of species incorrectly named. In a few instances, especially in the case of Seler plants, of which there is only a partial set in the herbarium of Field Museum, it has been impossible to verify or correct the records, because the specimens on which they were based could not be found. In listing the specific names of the Yucatan flora full biblio- graphic citations are given only for species described from the region. For these it has been the intention to report every generic transfer to which they have been subjected.

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