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. ==Hoax Australian fish==