Botanical explorations in the Bruce Peninsula, Ontario

There is one rather famous name attached to the botany of the Bruce Peninsula. This results from a paper published in the Royal Canadian Institute October 1940 entitled “Botanical Explorations in the Bruce Peninsula” authored by P. V. Krotkov, Department of Botany, University of Toronto. (A note at the bottom of the first page states “Mr. Krotkov died on March 29th, 1940”.) Krotkov’s objective was to “make an intensive survey of the whole region”, not only to “obtain full information on the (floristic) species present” including their “distribution within the area” but also “the collection and analysis of mineralogical and geological data to try and relate these edaphic factors to the composition of the vegetation”.
Although Krotkov is best known for his “Systematical List” of plants on the Bruce Peninsula, the main thrust of his paper was to address long-standing conjecture on why the Bruce Peninsula had so many rare and unusual plants, the most popular theory being that a portion of the Bruce Peninsula must not have been covered by the last ice age (Wisconsin). Krotkov found that there was “nothing to support the view”.