Career

Collecting localities

Collections

Literature

 

Richards, Paul Westmacott

 

(Source: Flora Malesiana ser. 1, 1: Cyclopaedia of collectors)

 

Born: 1908, Walton-on-the-Hill, Surrey, England.

 

career:

Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, England, 1933-37; University Demonstrator in Botany in the University of Cambridge, 1937-45, University Lecturer in Botany since 1945; in 1949 appointed Professor of Botany at the Univ. College N.Wales, Bangor. Member of the Oxford University Expedition to British Guiana, 1929. Visited Sarawak and parts of the Malay Peninsula as Botanist of the Oxford University Expedition to Sarawak, June 1932-Jan. 1933 (see below). Organized and led the Cambridge Botanical Expedition to Nigeria, 1935. In 1947/48 he was once more in Africa.

Author of publications dealing chiefly with the ecology of the tropical rainforest and with the taxonomy and ecology of British and foreign bryophytes.

Palaquium richardsii K. Griffioen & H.J. Lam, Taxitheliella richardsii Dixon, etc., were named after him.

 

Collecting localities:

Oxford Expedition to NW. Borneo, Sarawak, 1932.1 Leaving Liverpool (June 18); Singapore (July 16), leaving the same day for Kuching in Sarawak; Miri, up the Baram River to Claudetown (Marudi; ‘heath forest’ of Agathis! padang!); leaving Marudi (July 27); reaching base camp at the foot of Dulit Range near the Lejok (29); preparing mountain camp at 1500 m alt. (Aug.); another ‘heath forest’ was visited in the Koyan Valley, but it was too inaccessible for exploration; in Nov. Richards was staying at the base camp and made a short expedition up the Balapau River to G. Laiun; collecting was done too at Bidi, Bau, and Santubong; in Jan. 1933 back at Singapore; Malay Peninsula: Kuala Lumpur.

 

collections:

Herb. Kew [K]: 1st set, about 2765 nos, including c. 900 cryptogams.2 Duplicate set of trees to the Imp. Forestr. Inst. Oxford [OXF], remaining sets to Brit. Mus. [BM], Sing. [SING], Sarawak Mus. [SAR], etc.. Hepaticae in Herb. P.W. Richards.

They were assisted by a native collector; cf. also sub Synge. Several papers were based on the collections.3

 

literature:

(1) T.H. Harrisson: ‘The Oxford Expedition to Sarawak, 1932’ (Geogr. Journ. Lond. 1933, p. 385-410); ‘Borneo Jungle’ (an account of the Oxf. Exp. to Sarawak by several authors) (London 1938).

P.W. Richards: ‘Ecological observations on the rainforest of Mount Dulit, Sarawak’ 1-2 (Journ. Ecol. 24, 1936, p. 1-37, 340-360); ‘Lowland tropical podsols and their vegetation’ (Nature 148, 1941, p. 129-131); ‘The biogeographic division of the Indo-Australian Archipelago: 6. The ecological segregation of the Indo-Malayan and Australian elements in the vegetation of Borneo’ (Proc. Linn. Soc. Lond. Sess. 154, 1941/42, 1943, p. 154-156).

(2) cf. Mosses by H.N. Dixon in Journ. Linn. Soc. Bot. 56, 1935, p. 57-140, pl. 1-4.

cf. Botany in Geogr. Journ. Lond. 1933, p. 404-405.

(3) Loranthaceae by B.H. Danser in Rec. Trav. Bot. néerl. 31, 1934, p. 237.

Dipterocarpaceae by C.F. Symington in Gard. Bull. Str. Settlem. 8, 1934, p. 1-7.

Orchids by C.E. Carr in Gard. Bull. Str. Settlem. 8, 1935, p. 69-129.

Cyperaceae by H. Uittien in Rec. Trav. Bot. néerl. 32, 1935, p. 193-202, 3 fig.

Ericaceae by H. Sleumer in Engl. Bot. Jahrb. 71, 1941, p. 138-168.

In ‘Contributions to the Flora of Borneo and other Malay Islands etc. (in Kew Bull. 1936→).

cf. also sub 2.