In 1843, botanist and explorer Joseph Hooker visited the island. Four years later, Hooker advised the Royal Navy that with the help of Kew Gardens, they should develop a long-term plan of shipping trees to Ascension. So, from 1850 and continuing year on year, ships came each with different plants from botanical gardens in Argentina, Europe and South Africa. By the late 1870s Norfolk pines, eucalyptus, bamboo, and banana trees grew at the highest point of the island, Green Mountain, creating a tropical forest covered with clouds.