History of Ecological Sciences, Part 43: Plant Physiology, 1800s

Abstract

Plant geography and plant physiology were two foundations upon which plant ecology arose during the later 1800s.Plant geographers Alexander von Humboldt, Hewett Watson, Joseph Hooker, and de Candolle, father and son, were discussed in previous parts of this history.Building on the outstanding experimental studies on plant growth conducted during the 1700s, and on Antoine Lavoisier's chemical revolution, botanists, agronomists, and chemists established a flourishing plant physiology during the 1800s.Scientists in Britain, France, Germany, and Switzerland led the way.Two poorly developed theories accepted at the beginning of the 1800s, humus as fertilizer and vitalism, became discredited during the 1800s.Humus was disintegrated plant matter, which varied in composition from place to place, intermixed with topsoil.It was different from animal manure, though both seemed to have similar effects.There was a long tradition of using humus as fertilizer.Two early founders of agricultural chemistry were Scotsman Francis Home (1719-1813) and Swede Johan Gottschalk Wallerius (1709-1785).Home, a physician and later a medical professor at the University of Edinburgh, published his important Principles of Agriculture and Vegetation in 1757.

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