Sir Edward SalisburyDied 10 Nov 1978 at age 92 (born 16 Apr 1886).Sir Edward James Salisbury was an English botanist and ecologist who studied and published on the function of soil in the ecology of woodlands and dunes. He investigated plant germination and seed output. He wrote several popular books on not only garden flowers (The Living Garden: the How and Why of Garden Life, 1935), but also weeds and invasive species (Weeds and Aliens, 1961). After WW II, he gave a public lecture in 1945 on the unexpected growth of colorful weeds on the rubble of London's blitzed bomb sites. The colorful yellow and purple flowers provided a welcome relief in the desolate environment, and fascinated Salisbury by the resilience and mobility of weeds. One of his experiments was dropping seeds from a height of 9 feet to measure the time taken for them to reach the floor, which correlated with the ability of the weed to spread in the wind.« |
