An ecological survey of Natal: the Pietermaritzburg district

Abstract

A general account of the Vegetation of Natal(Annals of the Natal Museum II 1912) forms a prelimin­ary paper to the present one, in which the more detail­ed ecological survey of this colony is begun, In the first part of the former paper the various factors that influence plant life in Natal - geological structure and soil conditions, rainfall and mists, temperature, light, winds, fires, and animals - were described and discussed. Even in the comparatively small area dealt with in the present paper, most of the types of plant formation determined by those factors are found. In a general paper, which deals with the vegetation of a whole county most attention is naturally paid to the climatic factors, but when a detailed analysis of the various plant associations in a limited area is the object in view, the edaphic factors are of most importance, consequently in this paper more attention has been paid to the latter. At the same time it is well to keep in mind how greatly the edaphic factors are themselves influenced by the climatic factors and nowhere can this he better seen than in Natal