scholarly journals Why Plants Are Vital

Oryx ◽  
1980 ◽  
Vol 15 (5) ◽  
pp. 453-458
Author(s):  
Charlie Jarvis
Keyword(s):  
Panama Canal ◽  
Botanic Gardens ◽  
Threatened Plants ◽  
Wild Wheat ◽  
The Future ◽  
Staple Foods ◽  
Royal Botanic Gardens ◽  
Cape Horn

Man depends on plants for his food – directly through crops and indirectly through animals – and all our staple foods are derived from only about 30 species of plants. Yet we continue to fell the forests and clear land, exterminating plants that could possibly avert disasters in the future – just as the apparently useless wild wheat discovered in Turkey in 1948 proved to be resistant to certain diseases, including four races of rust, and is now used to breed rust-resistant hydrids. The author lists some of the disasters now occurring, such as siltation of waterways resulting from erosion due to forest destruction – some bulk cargoes are now diverted round Cape Horn due to silt in the Panama Canal. He asks, how severe must ecological disasters become before we recognise our dependence? Dr Jarvis works for IUCN's Threatened Plants Committee (TPC) at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

scholarly journals Threatened Plants – How to Save Them

Oryx ◽  
1976 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 257-258
Author(s):  
Grenville Lucas
Keyword(s):  
Flowering Plant ◽  
Botanic Gardens ◽  
Threatened Plants ◽  
Comprehensive Survey ◽  
Service Commission ◽  
Data Book ◽  
Royal Botanic Gardens ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Flowering Plant Species ◽  
Specialist Groups

In May 1974 IUCN set up the Threatened Plants Committee (TPC) of the Survival Service Commission, with Professor J. Heslop-Harrison, Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, as Chairman, and Grenville Lucas, also of Kew, as Secretary. The need for a comprehensive survey had been highlighted by Dr Ronald Melville's pioneer work in compiling the Red Data Book for plants. The Committee's task is to prepare a world list of endangered and threatened (flowering) plant species so that action plans can be drawn up. The world's decision-makers must have the facts. The work is centred at Kew. Material is collected and action planned, either through regional groups (the European group has already produced a preliminary draft of rare, threatened and endangered plants), or through specialist groups (a world-wide palm group was the first to be appointed). A third approach is through institutions – most of the world's major botanic gardens sent representatives to a conference at Kew in September 1975. The following is a summary, with extracts, of Grenville Lucas's paper on the work of the TPC read at the IUCN meeting in Kinshasa.

scholarly journals Conserving orthodox seeds of globally threatened plants ex situ in the Millennium Seed Bank, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, UK: the status of seed collections

2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (9-10) ◽  
pp. 2901-2949 ◽  
Author(s):  
Udayangani Liu ◽  
Tiziana A. Cossu ◽  
Rachael M. Davies ◽  
Félix Forest ◽  
John B. Dickie ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Seed Bank ◽  
Ex Situ ◽  
Botanic Gardens ◽  
Threatened Plants ◽  
The Status ◽  
Orthodox Seeds ◽  
Royal Botanic Gardens ◽  
Seed Collections

Annotations in copies of Thomas Johnson's Mercurius botanicus (1634) and Mercurii botanici, pars altera (1641): authorship and provenance

2016 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 208-220 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Edgington
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Botanic Gardens ◽  
Original Owner ◽  
Thomas Wilson ◽  
Royal Botanic Gardens

By an analysis of extensive and detailed annotations in copies of Thomas Johnson's Mercurius botanicus (1634) and Mercurii botanici, pars altera (1641) held in the library of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, the probable author is identified as William Bincks, an apprentice apothecary of Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey. Through Elias Ashmole, a friend of Bincks' master Thomas Agar, a link is established with the probable original owner, John Watlington of Reading, botanist and apothecary, and colleague of Thomas Johnson. The route by which the book ended up in the hands of Thomas Wilson, a journeyman copyist of Leeds, is suggested. Plants growing near Kingston-upon-Thames in the late seventeenth century, recorded in manuscript, are noted, many being first records for the county of Surrey.

Disposing of John Lindley's library and herbarium: the offer to Australia

2008 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-70 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. M. LUCAS
Keyword(s):  
United Kingdom ◽  
Botanic Gardens ◽  
Final Disposal ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Royal Horticultural Society ◽  
Royal Botanic Gardens ◽  
United Kingdom Government ◽  
The University ◽  
Joseph Hooker

Shortly before he died, John Lindley decided to dispose of his herbarium and botanical library. He sold his orchid herbarium to the United Kingdom government for deposit at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and then offered his library and the remainder of his herbarium to Ferdinand Mueller in Melbourne. On his behalf, Joseph Hooker had earlier unsuccessfully offered the library and remnant herbarium to the University of Sydney, using the good offices of Sir Charles Nicholson. Although neither the University of Sydney nor Mueller was able to raise the necessary funds to purchase either collection, the correspondence allows a reconstruction of a catalogue of Lindley's library, and poses some questions about Joseph Hooker's motives in attempting to dispose of Lindley's material outside the United Kingdom. The final disposal of the herbarium to Cambridge and previous analyses of the purchase of his Library for the Royal Horticultural Society are discussed. A list of the works from Lindley's library offered for sale to Australia is appended.

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