The Arizona copper camp., 1916-11-10
BIOLOGY STATION
IN CAT INAS

Announcement was recently made by
DR.. r. B. Won KleinSmid, president of
the University of Arizona, of a new
biological station in the Santa Catalina
mountains. This station will be about
80 miles from Tucson, on section of
land which has been leased by the Uni
versity for a period of 80 years. The
work will be under the direction of DIR.
J. ]. Thornber, professor of biology and
botany. In discussing the station re-
Gently, Dr. Thornber said:
I'VE have been interested for some
time in the location of biological
summer school in the Catalina coun-
tains. and last year Dr. Won KleinSmid
made bold TO ask congress for four sec
tions of land to be used for this pur-
pose. Through the forestry service,
congress arranged for us to have one
section of the land, which lies to the
south of Mt. Lemon, almost due west
of Sabine Canyon. We have a lease
on the land for 90 years, and no one
can use it unless he finds mine on it.
In addition to this we have leased
smaller sections for laboratories, DOR
mitories, etc.
'"This is the very. spot which we
wanted for laboratory site. There is
a stream near by which flows twelve
months in the year, so that pipes can
be run from the stream to the labora-
tory, giving us plenty of water.
'"The Catalina mountains have a
vertical altitude of about 1000 to $500
feet, and as the greatest plant growth
in the state occurs between the alti-
tudes 1000 to 10000 feet, they include
very large part of the growing condi-
tions for plants to live and continue to
live in our state. There are probably
100 different kinds of trees in the
state, one half of which are found in
the Catalinas themselves or in the
foothills. We have about 800 kinds of
grasses in the state, and $50 of these
are found in these mountains. The
great cactus area of the country lies
between the Santa Catalina and the
Santa Rita mountains, so that Tucson
might be said to be the capital of the
cactus area in the United States. We
know now of 35 different kinds grow
ing in the Catalinas. These mountains
are also representative of very large
number of plants in the state. Twelve
hundred of the 5000 species of native
plants of Arizona are found in these
mountains and foothills. If I should
extend a circle with radius Of 20
miles from the center of Mt. Lemon it
would include 1900 different varieties
of plants that are growing within. the
state. There are more plants CFing
in these mountains than there are in
many states in our union, and there
are more growing conditions in the
Catalinas than there are in 10 differ
ent states. The San Francisco noun
tains, in the northern part of the state
are high, but the number Of trees is less
II1du 20, anu lIlSI0 are IlOI IuOIS IIdu
1000 kinds of plants growing there.
They begin at an altitude of 1900 feet,
going up to $4,000, and there are prac-
tically no plants growing above 10000
that do not grow below. The Catalina
mountains may be compared with the
other mountains in the state as kind
of oasis, plant oasis. The Grand
Canyon is the only other place in the
state to be compared with it.
What are some of the courses that
we can teach in such a summer school?
First, course in plant Identification.
A student could go there and identify
three times as many plants as he could
identify here in a given time, and not
only that, but would meet many kinds
that do not grow down here. Some