François-Louis Laporte, comte de Castelnau

François-Louis Nompar de Caumont Laporte, comte de Castelnau (born François-Louis Nompar de Caumont La Force; 24 December 1802 – 4 February 1880) was a French naturalist, also known as François Laporte or Francis de Castelnau. The standard author abbreviation Castelnau is used to indicate him when citing a botanical name and zoological names other than insects. Laporte is typically used when citing an insect name, or Laporte de Castelnau.

Life Born in London, Castelnau studied natural history in Paris. From 1837 to 1841, he traveled in the United States, Texas, and Canada. He visited Middle Florida from November 1837 until March 1838, publishing "Essai sur la Floride du Milieu" in 1843. In Canada, he studied the fauna of the Canadian lakes and the river systems of Upper and Lower Canada (roughly corresponding to the modern provinces of Ontario and Quebec) and of the United States.

Castelnau, a French savant, was sent by Louis Philippe, in 1843, with two botanists and a taxidermist, on an expedition to cross South America from Rio de Janeiro to Lima, following the watershed between the Amazon and La Plata river systems, and thence to Pará. He was gone for five years, with the expedition lasting into 1847. and Guachi.

In 1856-57, he visited the Cape of Good Hope, travelling as far east as Algoa Bay, and subsequently wrote a treatise on South African fish (1861).

He served as the French consul in Bahia in 1848; in Siam sometime between 1856 and 1858, and in Melbourne, Australia, from 1864 to 1877. a species of ground beetle, Megacephala castelnaui, a species of scarab beetle, Hybosorus laportei, an aphid Cinara laportei, the spotback skate, Atlantoraja castelnaui the plant genus Laportea.

Works Histoire naturelle, 1837. Expédition dans les parties centrales de l'Amérique: histoire naturelle des insectes coléoptères, 1840. with Hippolyte Louis Gory , 1837–1841). Vues et souvenirs de l'Amérique du Nord, 1842. "Essai sur la Floride du Milieu", Nouvelles Annales des Voyages et des Sciences Géographiques, IV, 1843. , 1843.