Matskási István (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 79. (Budapest 1987)

Rajczy, M.: In memoriam László Vajda (1890-1986)

Vajda took photographs and collected the vaucher specimens not only in Hungary, but in the neighbouring countries as well. Together with his nephew, Ernő Vajda, they published their best photographs in a series entitled Flora photographica Hungáriáé from 1929 till 1941. First he only demonstrated his new photographs and had accounts on his field trips on the meetings of the Botanical Section of the Hungarian Natural History Society, but from 1936 on he began to give lectures on his new floristical data, and regularly published his results. This is the time when he met the man, who gave him advices in the field he had already liked for years, the bryology. This was a decisive event in his life. The bryologist Ádám Boros became his best friend and colleague afterwards. From that time on László Vajda spent more and more time on the study of these little plants. Within 10-15 years he became an excellent bryologist, specialist of the tiny leafy liverworts, that he knew better, than any other Hungarian bryologist. In 1952, when as a clerk he retired, he was appointed to a museologist's post in the Botanical Department of the Hungarian Natural History Museum. At last he had the possibility to devote all his time to bryology and to plant photography, his scientific ambitions were finally on the way of realization. Year by year he collected a number of bryophyte specimens in Hungary, in the Carpathians and even in the Alps and in Dalmatia. His last long field trip he had in the age of 84 in the Retyezát Mts. (Transylvanian Alps, Romania), where he climbed the 2400 m high ridge. In his last years in the Museum he worked on the new handbook of the Hungarian bryoflora, written together with his student, Sándor Orbán. This book is a turning-point in Hungarian bryology, the completion of an era which can be named as the exploration of Hungary bryologically. László Vajda had a long and fruitful life. In his field trips and in the gatherings of other bryologists he found nearly 100 new species for the Hungarian bryoflora and several ones for the neighbouring countries. The original bryophyte collection, about 30,000 specimens, is kept in the Botanical Department of the Hungarian Natural History Museum (BP), the duplicate collection has got to the herbarium of the Ho Shi Minh Teacher's College in Eger (EGR). His valuable collection of higher plants (containing many rarities and thus filling several gaps in the herbarium) and his phototheca are kept in BP as well. As a taxonomist, he described 24 new taxa (1 liverwort species amongst them) and 3 plant taxa are named after him. He wrote 74 scientific papers and several popular ones. It is almost impossible to count all the publications illustrated by his photographs. In 1985, he was awarded the Silver Medal, Order of Work for his botanical activities and the medal 'Pro Natura' for his activity on plant photography. LIST OF SCIENTIFIC PUBLICATIONS BY L. VAJDA* 1. VAJDA, E. & VAJDA, L. (1929-41): Flora photographica Hungáriáé. — Studium, Budapest, 400 plates. 2. VAJDA, L. (1936): Új adatok Magyarország növényzetéhez. Neue Angaben zur Flora Ungarns. — Bot. Közi. 33: 215, 234 (Sitzungsbericht). 3. VAJDA, L. (1937): Újabb adatok Magyarország flórájához. (Weitere Beiträge zur Flora von Ungarn.) — Bot. Közi. 34: 77, 84 (Sitzungsbericht). 4. VAJDA. L. (1937) : Néhány adat Magyarország flórájának ismeretéhez. (Einige Beiträge zur Kenntnis der Flora von Ungarn.) — Bot. Közl. 34: 230 (in Hungarian). 5. VAJDA, L. (1941): Corydalis budensis L. Vajda = C. cavaxsolida, hybr. nov. — Bot. Közl. 38: 183 (in Hungarian with Latin description). * The list comprises all his scientific papers except those which appeared as abstracts ('Sitzungsberichte') of his lectures on the meetings of the Botanical Section and were published as separate papers afterwards.