Ecology: A science of nation? The utilization of plant ecology in New Zealand, 1896-1930

Historical Records of Australian Science

Volumn 17, Issue 2, 2006, Pages 197-207

  Star, Paul ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF OTAGO   (New Zealand)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 33751017987     PISSN: 07273061     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1071/HR06005     Document Type: Review

References (84)

1. A version of this paper was delivered at the Australasian Association for the History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Science conference, Dunedin, in December 2005.
2. Libby Robin, 'Ecology: A Science of Empire?', in Ecology and Empire: Environmental History of Setter Societies, ed. Tom Griffiths and Libby Robin (Keele University Press, Edinburgh, 1997), pp. 63-75.
3. More precisely, displacement theory maintained that a more rigorous selection process had resulted in the evolution in Europe of species superior to those indigenous to other regions. Therefore, when placed in competition, the former were bound to displace the latter. For the New Zealand context, see Ross Galbreath, 'Images of Colonisation: Native Rats and Dying Pillows', The Turnbull Library Record, 26 (1) (1993), 33-42;
4. Paul Star, 'Plants, Birds and Displacement Theory in New Zealand, 1840-1900', British Review of New Zealand Studies, 10 (1997), 5-21.
5. From a British perspective, 'biology provided a new vocabulary with which to express old explanations for dominance, subordination, and violence' and 'the science of plants ... garlanded imperial power with a natural legitimacy': Richard Drayton, Nature's Government: Science, Imperial Britain, and the 'Improvement' of the World (Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 2000), pp. 172, 225.
6. While there may be continuity between evolutionary and ecological theory in terms of the broad picture of society's use of science, the latter was not a simple continuation of thought from evolutionary precepts. Indeed, it has been argued that 'ecology emerged not from Darwinism, but from an extension of physiology into the realm of the organism's relationship to its surroundings': Peter J. Bowler, The Fontana History of the Environmental Sciences (HarperCollins, London, 1992), p. 364.
7. For an analysis of the different cultural circumstances that fostered Clements' approach in America but a much less utilitarian approach from J. Braun-Blanquet in France, see Malcolm Nicolson, 'National Styles, Divergent Classifications: A Comparative Case Study from the History of French and American Plant Ecology', Knowledge and Society: Studies in the Sociology of Science Past and Present, 8 (1989) 139-186.
8. Bowler, The Fontana History, p. 377.
9. John Sheail, Seventy-Five Years in Ecology: The British Ecological Society (Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford, 1987), p. 109.
10. A. D. Thomson, The Life and Correspondence of Leonard Cockayne (Caxton Press, Christchurch, 1983).
11. L. Cockayne, 'Observations Concerning Evolution, Derived from Ecological Studies in New Zealand', Transactions of the New Zealand Institute (TNZI), 44 (1911), 1-50.
12. TNZI, 32 (1899), 95-136.
13. See also L. Cockayne, 'A Short Account of the Plant Covering of Chatham Island', TNZI, 34 (1901), 243-325, a specifically 'oecological' study based on six weeks he spent on the Chathams early in 1901.
14. L. Cockayne to W. B. Hemsley, 5 February 1913, quoted in A. D. Thomson, 'Annotated Summaries of Letters to Colleagues by the New Zealand Botanist Leonard Cockayne', New Zealand Journal of Botany, 17 (1979), 389-416.
15. Cockayne was particularly influenced by the German botanist Karl von Goebel, who he regarded as his 'master'. They corresponded from 1892 and met in New Zealand in 1898: see L. Cockayne to K. von Goebel, 12 February 1914, quoted in Thomson, 'Annotated Summaries'.
16. See Paul Star, 'Native Bird Protection, National Identity and the Rise of Preservation in New Zealand to 1914', New Zealand Journal of History, 36 (2) (2002), 123-136;
17. Paul Star, 'Native Forest and the Rise of Preservation in New Zealand, 1903-1913', Environment and History, 8 (3) (2002), 275-294.
18. L. Cockayne, 'Report of a Botanical Survey of the Waipoua Kauri Forest', Appendices to the Journal of the House of Representatives (AJHR), 1908 C14, 29, 31.
19. L. Cockayne, 'Report on a Botanical Survey of the Tongariro National Park', AJHR, 1908 C11, 13.
20. In the following year, Cockayne made out a case for the protection of Stewart Island, claiming it as 'an actual piece of the primeval world' that should be 'kept sacred' and 'religiously guarded'. L. Cockayne, 'Report on a Botanical Area of Stewart Island', AJHR, 1909 C12, 41-42.
21. Otago Daily Times, 2 October 1902.
22. Leonard Cockayne, The Cultivation of New Zealand Plants (Whitcombe and Tombs, Christchurch, 1923), p. 8.
23. L. Cockayne, 'Presidential Address' to the New Zealand Institute Science Congress, New Zealand Journal of Science and Technology (NZJST), 2 (1919), 242, 248.
24. In 1905, Cockayne's own son had applied an ecological approach to the analysis of a particular plant community. The Government was buying the Flaxbourne Estate and needed to know how much compensation to offer. As a Department of Agriculture employee, young Alfred Cockayne provided a written assessment of the value of its pasture, for which ecology provided a structure and vocabulary. See Department of Agriculture, Annual Report (1905), pp. 400-403.
25. L. Cockayne, 'The importance of plant ecology with regard to agriculture', NZJST, 1 (1918), 70-74.
26. In 1916, in his presidential address to the British Ecological Society, Francis Oliver urged ecologists to apply themselves to 'profitable channels' by aiding in the exploitation and improvement of the land. Sheail, Seventy-Five Years in Ecology, p. 48.
27. L. Cockayne, 'Presidential Address', p. 246.
28. L. Cockayne, 'Report on the Sand Dunes of New Zealand', AJHR, 1909 C13;
29. L. Cockayne and A. H. Cockayne, 'Yellow Flax Disease of Phormium tenax' [abstract only], NZJST, 2 (1919), 256.
30. L. Cockayne, 'An Economic Investigation of the Montane Tussock-Grassland of New Zealand: 1: Introduction', New Zealand Journal of Agriculture (NZJAg), 18 (1919), 1-9.
31. L. Cockayne, Monograph on the New Zealand Beech Forests: Volume 2: The Forests from the Practical and Economic Standpoints (Government Printer, Wellington, 1928), pp. 13, 20, 31.
32. G. M. Thomson, 'Scientific research in New Zealand ... since 1 January 1923', NZJST, 8 (1925), 41-62.
33. Two ecological studies were published in 1913: Miss E. J. Pegg, 'An Ecological Study of Some New Zealand Sand-Dune Plants', TNZI, 46 (1913), 150-177,
34. and Miss L. A. Suckling, 'Plant Ecology of the Forests of the Port Hills', TNZI, 46 (1913), 178. Both women were students of Charles Chilton, professor of biology at Canterbury College and a friend of Cockayne.
35. 'Ecological study of the flora of a coastal-cliff formation near Sinclair Head' (Beryl Jackson, BA, Victoria University College);
36. 'The ecology of the plants of Lawyer's Head, Dunedin' (Earl F. Northcroft, MA, University of Otago);
37. 'The ecology and regeneration of the Westland taxad rain forest' (C. E. Foweraker, MA, Canterbury University College);
38. 'Ecological investigation of the southern beech forests' (L. Cockayne, for State Forest Service);
39. 'Ecology of New Zealand grass-lands' (E. B. Levy, Department of Agriculture);
40. and 'Marine ecology of Wellington coast' (W. R. B. Oliver, Dominion Museum). As in Britain until the beginning of Charles Elton's work in 1924, no-one was looking specifically at animal ecology.
41. Cockayne began corresponding with Charles Foweraker in 1911, and in 1916 described him as 'the most promising botanist ... that the New Zealand university has yet produced': L. Cockayne to David Prain, 4 May 1916, quoted in Thomson, 'Annotated Summaries'. Foweraker's examination of the ecology of podocarp forest suggested that rimu and other native timbers might be logged sustainably. From 1920, the State Forest Service engaged William McGregor of Auckland University College's botany department in 'an ecological and silvicultural investigation of the native forests (especially Kauri) in the Auckland district'. The significance of early work on forest ecology in New Zealand awaits thorough historical research. McGregor subsequently became leader of the Waipoua Forest Preservation Society, which lobbied for protection of the kauri remnant as a matter of national importance. See Michael Roche, History of New Zealand Forestry (GP Books, Wellington, 1990), pp. 192-199, 405-413.
42. Robin, 'Ecology: A Science of Empire?', p. 68.
43. The change would not have been expressed in this way. Even the term 'ecosystem' was only coined in 1935, when Tansley first used it to describe the totality of plants and animals interacting within a specific context.
44. Evidence of this trend broadly supports the theory of New Zealand's 'recolonization' at the time, as proposed in James Belich, Paradise Reforged: A History of the New Zealanders from the 1880s to the Year 2000 (Allen Lane, The Penguin Press, Auckland, 2001), pp. 27-32.
45. As John Sheail has pointed out, 'The ecologist is likely to be particularly interested in grassland practices because advances in this aspect of husbandry would reflect the farmer's ability not only to manipulate single species crops but also plant communities': Sheail, Seventy-Five Years in Ecology, p. 54. Grassland, though the layperson may think of it as 'just grass', is in reality an assemblage of different species of grasses, clovers, other fodder plants, and weeds, much as a forest consists of different species of trees and other plants.
46. Sheail, Seventy-Five Years in Ecology, p. 114,
47. referring to the content of Aims and Methods in the Study of Vegetation, ed. A. G. Tansley and T. F. Chipp (British Empire Vegetation Committee and Crown Agents, London, 1926),
48. which includes Leonard Cockayne's 'Notes on Ecological Fieldwork in New Zealand'.
49. Sheail, Seventy-Five Years in Ecology, pp. 37, 54.
50. R. G. Stapledon, A Tour in Australia and New Zealand: Grass Land and Other Studies (Oxford University Press, London, 1928), p. vii.
51. Sheail notes that 'whilst Stapledon frequently called for a global viewpoint, it was the opportunity afforded by the Imperial connection ... that excited him most': John Sheail, 'Grassland Management and the Early Development of British Ecology', British Journal of the History of Science, 19 (1986), 283-299.
52. Stapledon, A Tour, pp. 31, 66.
53. Stapledon perhaps later realised the ambiguities in his use of the word, since he wrote, in 1938: 'The so-called indigenous strains! Badly called, and I am afraid that I have been largely responsible'. R. G. Stapledon, The Way of the Land (Faber and Faber, London, 1943), p. 198.
54. Stapledon, A Tour, pp. 95-96.
55. This phrase is from Drayton, Nature's Government.
56. Stapledon, The Way of the Land, pp. 45, 47.
57. Levy began his career as an assistant to Leonard Cockayne's son Alfred, who was government biologist in 1909 and rose to be Director General of Agriculture from 1936. As Alfred Cockayne became involved in administration he ceased doing research, so while he at first inspired Levy, increasingly Levy's research and opinions informed Cockayne's views on pasture. This was clearly the case by 1926, when Cockayne retreated from his earlier advocacy both of diverse seed mixes and of cocksfoot and instead, like Levy, he began promoting a 'duoculture' of ryegrass and clover. See A. H. Cockayne, 'New Zealand Agriculture: Its Trend in the Past Quarter-Century', NZJAg, 32 (1926), 88-92.
58. Levy's unpublished autobiography, written when he was 82, plots his progress. E. B. Levy, 'Memoirs of Bruce Levy, Grasslander - an Autobiography', MS-Papers-3410, Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington.
59. It is interestingly complemented by the unpublished autobiography of mycologist G. H. Cunningham, who hated Levy and considered his emphasis on ryegrass misguided. He claimed of Levy that, 'following [Alfred] Cockayne, he was strongly pro-German during the [First World] war, which to any returned soldier [like Cunningham] placed him outside the pale': G. H. Cunningham, 'Autobiography', MS-Papers-3950, Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, pp. 126, 233.
60. The standard accounts are J. D. Gould, 'Pasture Formation and Improvement in New Zealand, 1871-1911', Australian Economic History Review, 16 (1976), 1-22,
61. and P. W. Smallfield, The Grasslands Revolution in New Zealand (Hodder and Stoughton, Auckland, 1970).
62. Recent reassessments are Ross Galbreath, DSIR: Making Science Work for New Zealand: Themes from the History of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, 1926-1992 (Victoria University Press, Wellington, 1998), pp. 58-79;
63. and Tom Brooking, Robin Hodge and Vaughan Wood, 'The Grasslands Revolution Reconsidered', in Environmental Histories of New Zealand, ed. Eric Pawson and Tom Brooking (Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 2002), pp. 169-182.
64. E. B. Levy, 'The Grasslands of New Zealand: Principles of Pasture Establishment', NZJAg, 23 (1921), 257-265.
65. E. B. Levy, 'The Grasslands of New Zealand: Preliminary Ecological Classification of Species', NZJAg, 30 (1925), 357-374.
66. E. B. Levy, 'Fundamental Grassland Research: Scheme of Experimentation Initiated by Department of Agriculture', NZJAg, 37 (1928), 1-7.
67. For background, see Galbreath, DSIR; and C. B. Schedvin, Shaping Science and Industry: A History of Australia's Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, 1926-49 (Allen and Unwin, Sydney, 1987).
68. In Britain, the Development Commission, formed in 1909, supported a range of scientific research institutes before the British DSIR emerged, including the Welsh Plant Breeding Station and other institutes involved in plant breeding and 'agricultural botany'. See Robert Olby, 'Social Imperialism and State Support for Agricultural Research in Edwardian Britain', Annals of Science, 48 (1991), 509-526.
69. Similarly, under pressure from a group including Leonard Cockayne, the New Zealand Government created a Board of Art and Science from 1913 that received limited funding for scientific research. See Michael E. Hoare, 'The Board of Science and Art, 1913-1930: A Precursor to the DSIR', in In Search of New Zealand's Scientific Heritage: Selected Papers from the History of Science in New Zealand Conference, ed. M. E. Hoare and L. G. Bell (Royal Society of New Zealand, Wellington, 1984), pp. 25-48.
70. Stapledon, The Way of the Land, pp. 204-205. Griffiths' brother, J. Griffiths Davies, played an equally prominent role in the development of grasslands in Australia.
71. William Davies, 'Strain in Relation to the Grasslands of New Zealand', NZJST, 8 (1930), 180-187.
72. E. B. Levy and William Davies, 'Relationship and Control of Annual Grasses and Clovers in Pasture: The Hawkes Bay and Poverty Bay Flats', NZJAg, 40 (1930), 147-158.
73. E. B. Levy, and W. Davies, 'Strain Investigation Relative to Grasses and Clovers', NZJAg, 39 (1929), 1-8.
74. Sheail, Seventy-Five Years in Ecology, p. 115.
75. Robin, 'Ecology: A Science of Empire?', p. 67.
76. Preface to second edition of E. Bruce Levy, Grasslands of New Zealand (Government Printer, Wellington, 1955).
77. Levy, 'Memoirs', p. 35.
78. L. Cockayne, 'Presidential Address', p. 248;
79. L. Cockayne, 'Report on a Botanical Survey of the Tongariro National Park', p. 3.
80. Geoff Park, Nga Uruora: The Groves of Life: Ecology and History in a New Zealand Landscape (Victoria University Press, Wellington, 1995), pp. 369, 337. 'Pakeha' is a term for New Zealanders of European descent.
81. R. J. Moore-Colyer, 'Sir George Stapledon (1882-1960) and the Landscape of Britain', Environment and History, 5 (1999), 221-236.
82. Peter Holland, unpublished presentation on 'Plant selection for improved pastures: Good luck or good management?', University of Otago, Dunedin, 17 March 2005.
83. J. A. Lancashire, 'Special Address: 150 Years of Grasslands Development in New Zealand', Proceedings of the New Zealand Grasslands Association, 52 (1990), 9-15.
84. Donald Worster, Nature's Economy: A History of Ecological Ideas (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985).