Collecting in rainforest presents the challenge of bringing specimens down from the top of 40m trees, preserving the material for transport, and avoiding ants and snakes.
Expedition
How it started, how it was run.
Palawans botanical history
Palawan was first illustrated in John Whiteheads "The Exploration of Kina Bali" in 1893.
For more detail check the story of why the expedition was run
The Collections
A total of 1870 herbarium specimens mostly in sets of ten (so, over 18 000 individuals sheets), 861 bark and wood samples and 239 living plants were collected from 47 localities in the primary rain-forests of Palawan. As specimen identification to species and to a lesser extent generic level still continues, only an estimate of the number of species is possible. This estimate is 750 species. In addition, 35 marine and freshwater diatom samples were collected. 348 species were recorded dams 4 new species have been described.
Superficial Analysis
- 43% of the collected plants have a known use or are closely related to those with a known use. 8% of these produce timber, 15% timber and food and 77% food, cane, resins etc..
- 28 vegetation types were described. The Irawan R. valley - Mt. Beaufort area was richest both in vegetation types and in species composition. Lake Manguao (Danao) and Mt.Victoria were the next richest areas,
- 151 of the collected plants are known to be new to Palawan. This represents a 10% increase in the known flora. This was the status in 1985. Since then selective reviews have shown that up to 2024:
- Orchidaceae: 40 new species were added, including 13 new genera. The genus Bulbophyllum alone went for 3 species to 15.
- Arecidae: 16 species were added to the 38 known palm species (a 42%) increase.
- A new palm, Heterospathe dransfeldii, a fragrant shrub (Fagerlindia emanuelsonii) and 3 new diatom species were quickly described after the expedition.
- 40 years later, new species continue to be described from the collections.
Virgin Rainforest Value
This was written in 1982! 'There is every indication that with the growing rarity of intact vegetation and forests, there will be a dramatic increase in the commercial value of wild genomes. Twenty years hence they will constitute a considerable source of revenue for those in control of the areas in which they are found. Nor will this be a temporary source of revenue, since the purchased genomes will become integrated by means of sexual reproduction with the genomes already present in cultivated plants. Thus for every improvement it will again be necessary to resort to the virgin forest' (Oldeman & Boerboom, 1982).
