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Observations by David Douglas
Page 2 of 3
Rocky Mountain forest of "spruce, pine and fir," near Lolo Pass, Montana
Photo © by James L. Reveal
In 1914, just as the secretary of the Royal Horticultural Society, the Reverend William Wilks, and the Society's librarian, H. R. Hutchinson, were finishing their editing of the journal kept by David Douglas during his travels in North America, they came upon two hand-written manuscripts by Douglas entitled "Some American Pines." The two copies were drafts of the same paper, and Wilks and Hutchinson combined the two into a single document that they published (pp. 338–48 in Douglas's Journal). The editors suggested that the two manuscripts were "about the same date as the other manuscripts from which the rest of this volume has been printed," or some time between 1823 and 1827. This seems unlikely.
Spreading canopy of sugar pine with its pendulous cones
Photo © by James L. Reveal
In reviewing the text, some hint of a date begins to appear. First, the manuscript published in 1914 discusses conifers observed by Douglas in the Pacific Northwest and Canada during the years 1823–27. It does not mention any of the new California conifers, most significantly Pinus sabiniana published by Douglas in the Transactions of the Linnaean Society in 1833. It does mention P. lambertiana, the sugar pine that was described by Douglas in 1827, giving the page upon which the name was formally established. This would date the manuscript sometime after Douglas' return to England on 15 Oct 1827, and almost certainly after the article was published in mid-December of that year. Equally important is that Abies grandis (Douglas ex D. Don) Lindl., or what Douglas would later call Pinus grandis Douglas ex D. Don, was not included in the manuscript. This species was not found until the year after Douglas left London on 26 Oct 1829. Finally, Douglas states that he never had it in his power to procure perfect specimens of Pinus monticola, a situation that would be resolved in 1830.
What is curious is this: Why was Pinus lambertiana published by Douglas almost immediately upon his arrival in London, but none of the other species? An answer is not immediately obvious, but the following speculations may be made.
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David Douglas (1799-1834)