Before the 1950s, humans 'understanding of Argyros was limited to the fossil level and characterized it as an ancient plant that had long been extinct. In 1954, Professor Zhong Jixin from Guangxi Forestry University led students to Guilin County, Guangxi for an annual teaching internship. In the past, people thought that there was no virgin forest near Guilin, but this time under the guidance of fellow villagers, they discovered a large area of virgin forest in the Tianping Mountains. There were 1100 species of plants, including more than 80 species of plants endemic to the region. This natural green treasure house is the famous Huaping Nature Reserve today. During the inspection, they found a young seedling that at first glance looked like a Keteleeria plant. However, after careful observation, Professor Zhong Jixin found that its leaves were longer and narrowed at both ends. He intuitively judged that it might be an unknown new species of plant. In order to confirm his speculation, Professor Zhong entered the mountains many times to explore, and finally found adult silver fir in the spring of 1956 and collected a complete set of specimens with male and female flowers and fruits.
The set of specimens was sent to the Beijing Institute of Botany for identification by two famous China botanists, Professor Chen Huanyong and Kuang Keren. They agreed that from the aspects of leaves, bud scales, bract scales, stamens, etc., this plant should be a member of the Pinaceae family, but its leaves are as flat as lines and are very similar to those of the genus Pseudosequia. After a lot of textual research and comparison, the two scholars confirmed that it is a new species of pinaceae and the first endemic species of pine and fir discovered in China since the birth of New China in 1949. Because of its beautiful silvery white crown, it was named Silver fir. In 1957, Professor Chen Huanyong read out his paper "A New Genus of Pinaceae in Southwest China-Argyrotaxus" at the Annual Conference of Botany of the Soviet Union, and it was officially published in the Soviet Journal of Botany in 1958.
Since the first silver fir tree came out, botanists have discovered nearly 100 silver fir trees in the dense forest of Xinning County, Hunan Province, the tallest of which reached 20 meters. In 1980, Guizhou scholars discovered patches of silver fir forest growing in Yangxi Township at an altitude of more than 1400 meters, including more than 900 seedlings, young trees and big trees, and the natural renewal is very good.
Who was the first person to discover silver fir?
Focusing on the question of "who was the first person to discover Argyrus argenina", this article reviews the wild plants of Argyrus argenina, which were once determined to have been extinct, were first discovered by Professor Zhong Jixin in the 1950s, and were identified and named by Professors Chen Huanyong and Kuang Keren, and the subsequent complete process of discovering Argyrus argenina communities in many places in China.
