ABSTRACT
Geography students quickly become aware of the problems of defining their subject. Whereas the subject matter of some branches of the discipline can be easily stated this is not so with biogeography. Geography itself has been variously defined as the study of: areal distributions, spatial patterns, locational analysis, man-land relationships, the environmental relationships of man. Biogeography implies a linkage between Biology and Geography. It studies the distribution of biological materials over the earth’s surface and the factors responsible for the observed spatial variations. This provides a spatial pattern for study as fundamental as the variations in rock type (geology), land forms (geomorphology) or atmospheric processes (climatology). We seek not simply to describe these patterns but also to explain them: the question ‘Where?’ must be followed by the question ‘Why?’.
