Gardner, Charles A. (1869 - 1970)

Appointed to the Western Australian Forests Department as a plant collector in 1920, Gardner transferred to the Department of Agriculture in 1924 as assistant to the Economic Botanist and Plant Pathologist. In January 1929 he became Government Botanist and Curator of the State Herbarium, a position he held until retirement in 1960. He published extensively on the Western Australian flora, the most important works being Botanical Notes, Kimberley Division of Western Australia (1923), the series Contributions to the flora of Western Australia in J. [Proc.] Roy. Soc. W. Australia from 1923, Enumeratio Plantarum Australiae Occidentalis (1930) and Flora of Western Australia Vol. 1, part 1, Gramineae (1952). Gardner was an enthusiastic collector, his first official expedition to the northern Kimberley in 1921 yielding 325 specimens. By 1946 he estimated his collections at 10 000 sheets. He described eight genera and about 200 species of Western Australian plants in about 320 publications. Gardner's personal herbarium was bequeathed to the Benedictine Community at New Norcia, but was transferred to PERTH in June 1970. Lesser numbers of specimens are in A, AIB, B, K, MEL and NSW.

Extracted from: A.E.Orchard (1999) A History of Systematic Botany in Australia, in Flora of Australia Vol.1, 2nd ed., ABRS. [consult for source references]