orchids and orchidology in central america. 500 ... - lankesteriana.org

ossenbaCh — Orchids and orchidology in Central America
The orchIds of The panama canal
“Since its completion in 1914, the Panama
Canal has been Panama’s economic base,
and the United States presence has been the
republic’s major source of frustration”
(http://www.canalmuseum.com/
stories/history_of_panama_001.htm)
“Completely different from Suez, where the desert
hardly provoked any naturalistic concerns, the tropical
nature of Panama was a complex challenge to Science....
At the center of these concerns about the impact of the
canal on the surrounding environment was the formation
of Lake Gatún. Its waters, while flooding the lower
course of the Chagres River, would drown or drive
away the majority of the plants and animals and would
extinguish many unknown species.... Other unknowns
were the changes that could take place once the waters
and organisms of both watersheds came together...”
(Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 74) (Fig. 51, A—B). There
was also a practical interest in undertaking a biological
survey of such importance: to enrich the collections of
Panamanian flora and fauna in the museums of natural
science in the United States. Leaders among those
who undertook the biological exploration not only of
Panama, but of the whole American continent, where
two institutions which had been founded fifty years
earlier: the Smithsonian Institution and the Missouri
Botanical Garden.
The biological exploration of the Smithsonian
Institution. “... When the floodgates of the great earth
dam which impounded the Chagres River started to
close in April of 1910... the world’s largest artificial lake
started to form: Lake Gatún. Suddenly, with the imminent
flooding of over 60 villages and hundreds of square miles
of jungle, the biological study of the region affected by
the canal works became a scientific priority. Never before
had the biologists had the unexpected possibility of
exploring the highest tree tops by simply rowing a boat
[...] In this odyssey of knowledge that took place on the
isthmus, the Smithsonian Institution of Washington D.
C., which undertook the first great biological survey of
Panama between 1910 and 1912, played a principal role”
(Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 73-74).
The first group of a great number of specialists in
different branches of biological sciences which would
161
visit the canal during the following years, gathering
information and extensive collections, disembarked in
Colón on December 28, 1910. In charge of the Botany was
Henri Pittier, from the U. S. Department of Agriculture,
who resided in Panama from 1910 to1912. According to
the original plan, the study would require one year and
would be limited to the immediate neighborhood of the
canal excavations. However, the need to extend the area
of study became clear very soon, and the explorations
were extended to the whole territory of Panama. Field
work, which lasted until March of 1912, began after
Pittier’s request was granted and he could count on the
help of William R. Maxon, who arrived in Panama in
February, 1911. Pittier collected and classified 1,750
species of plants in 154 different localities, among
them many orchids. “After he returned to Washington
[1912], Henri and his young assistant Paul C. Standley
attacked the gigantic task of analyzing and publishing
the scientific data of the vast collection of Panamanian
plants [with the help of European specialists], many of
them new to science. The publications were to appear
under the joint seal of the U. S. National Herbarium and
the Smithsonian Institution” (Heckadon-Moreno, 1998:
84). Pittier wanted to write his final report in Latin, the
classical language of Botany, employed by nine tenths of
the systematic botanists, but he encountered resistance
among the members of the Editorial Committee, who
wanted everything to be written in English. Finally, the
Secretary of the Smithsonian decided salomonically to
publish the manuscripts part in Latin and part in English.
The quarrel with the languages delayed the publications
and upset the relations between the American and
European naturalists. These difficulties paled however at
the outbreak of World War I, when the relations among
the international scientific community were finally and
completely disrupted (Heckadon-Moreno, 1998: 85).
William Ralph Maxon (1877-1948) (Fig. 51C)
worked during his whole life for the New York
Botanical Garden and the U. S. National herbarium. He
had collected plants with Pittier in Chiriquí as early as
1900. In 1905 he visited Guatemala and in 1906 Costa
Rica (Maxon, 1906). He arrived in Costa Rica at Puerto
Limon and collected in the provinces of San José,
Cartago and Alajuela. Some of the orchids of the Maxon
herbarium were given to him by Pablo Biolley, who
cultivated them in his garden in San José (Nash, 1907).
Maxon spent a time during 1911 in Panama, where he
LANKESTERIANA 9(1—2), August 2009. © Universidad de Costa Rica, 2009.