Léon Abel Provancher

Canada 1820-1892

Léon Abel Provancher was born in 1820, in Bécancour, about fifty miles from Quebéc City or Montreal. Provancher started the field of Canadian natural science (1); his interest in the natural sciences began when he saw a fossil shellfish discovered by workmen building a well. (2) As a boy, Provancher learned the names of a variety of plants. In 1834, he won a scholarship which allowed him to attend the Séminaire de Nicolet. Even at this age, his knowledge of horticulture was enough to regularly win prizes. (2) Provancher was ordained a priest at Quebec in 1844. For the next 4 years he moved from parish to parish as a curate.(2)

In 1848, he resumed his work in horticulture. His movement to the different parishes allowed him to investigate the flora and fauna of Canada.(2) In September 1854, Provancher became a parish priest at Saint-Joachim, where he stayed 8 years--much longer than at the previous other parishes.(2) He renovated Saint Joachim and attempted to find new sources of revenue.(2) In 1857 under the pseudonym of Émilien Dupont, he published Essai sur les insectes et les maladies qui affectent le blé. This book was written for a government-sponsored contest hoping to help solve the issue of hessian flies. Grain farmers had been afflicted by the flies since the flies arrived in the 1830s.(2) Provancher won third prize for his submission.(2)

“In 1858 he published Traité élémentaire de botanique . . . ; the first of its kind in Canada”.(2) “It was used in educational institutions for many years, until the publication of Louis-Ovide Brunet’s Éléments de botanique et de physiologie végétale . . . (Quebec, 1870) and Jean Moyen’s Cours élémentaire de botanique et Flore du Canada . . . (Montreal, 1871)”.(2) In 1861 Provancher met Brunet, a professor of botany at Université Laval, and collected plants with him throughout Canada. At this point, Provancher became interested in the insect parasites in his garden, and began to study entomology under William Couper. He was so intent on this he requested materials from from New York and Washington.

However, Provancher’s outspokenness caused offense to the priests at the Seminary of Québec and the parishioners of Saint-Joachim. After several reprimands, he was assigned to Notre-Dame-de-Portneuf in 1862. As in his previous parish, Provancher helped with finances and repairs of the church. He helped the community by working with the Franciscan Third Order, and created a fruit tree nursery as a model for farmers, among other things.(2) Provancher devoted his free time to entomology, established connections with Canadians and Americans who were well known in the field, and asked them to help him with his identification, and his difficult cases.(2) In 1862, Provancher published Le verger canadien, which means the Canadian orchard. This book contained the necessary information to grow a variety of plants in Lower Canada.(2)

Also in 1862, Provancher received a government grant and so he was able to publish a work on Canadian Flowers. (2) Provancher used information from various American writers, for which American botanist Asa Gray criticized Provancher (2) Most professional botanists followed Gray’s example, and so Flore canadienne was relegated to the French Canadian amateurs for 70 years.(2) In 1868 Provancher published Le Naturaliste canadien as a newspaper for for scientists to publish their findings, and so that amateurs would become interested in the study of nature. Provancher stated that he “intended to devote a good deal of space to entomology, but his magazine also served as a forum for his ideas on a host of other topics.”.(2)

However, once again, Provancher’s personality caused issues with his parishioners. In 1866 he attempted to find a different occupation. On the advice of the archbishop of Quebec, he submitted his resignation from parish work on September 17, 1869.(2) From there he settled at Saint-Roch in order to be with the main libraries and other naturalists. Provancher became bored with urban life, and moved to Cap-Rouge.(2) In 1888 he published La Semaine religieuse de Québec, mainy for the clergy.(2) Provancher made frequent trips within Canada, to the United States, Europe and the Holy Land, to which he organized and even attended.(1;2) At Cap Rouge Provancher spent most of his time on the natural sciences.(2) He left plant collecting in favor of being an entomologist, and people came to him for answers and encouragement. In 1874 Provancher began publishing “Petite faune entomologique du Canada. . . ,” an enormous project, which demonstrated his enthusiasm for the field. His text first appeared in Le Naturaliste canadien, and was later corrected and expanded. Ultimately, it became three volumes containing every known species in Canadian insect at the time. (2) The Petite faune long remained a work of value unequalled in the country.(2)

However, it was a particular subset of this work that was the most interesting. Specifically, his work on discovering and describing hymenoptera, an order of insects including wasps and bees, that Provencher that contributed most to the advancement of science.(2) Rather than combining information from other sources as he had done in the past, for this book he personally discovered and described over 1,000 previously unknown species of this order.(2) His contribution finally gave him lasting fame in the scientific world. His work was monumental, covering a tenth of the species of hymenoptera now known in Canada.


Works Referenced

1. Léon Abel Provancher http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12505a.htm 
2. Dictionary of Canadian Biography http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/provancher_leon_12E.html