Gregor Mendel both his professors at the Palacký University, Olomouc (Friedrich Franz and Johann Karl Nestler), and his colleagues at the monastery (such as Franz Diebl) to study variation in plants. In 1854, Napp authorized Mendel to carry out a study in the monastery's experimental garden, which was originally planted by Napp in 1830. Unlike Nestler, who studied hereditary traits in sheep, Mendel used the common edible pea and started his experiments in 1856. After initial experiments with pea plants, Mendel settled on studying seven traits that seemed to be inherited independently of other traits: seed shape, flower color, seed coat tint,
Catholic Church and evolution development of evolutionary theory included those of the Jesuit-educated French scientist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744-1829) and of the Augustinian monk Gregor Mendel (1822-1884). Lamarck developed Lamarckism, the first coherent theory of evolution, proposing in "Philosophie Zoologique" (1809) and other works his theory of the transmutation of species. He constructed a genealogical tree to show the genetic connection of organisms. Mendel entered the Brno Augustinian monastery in 1843, but also trained as a scientist at the Olmutz Philosophical Institute and at the University of Vienna. The Brno monastery was a centre of scholarship, with an extensive library and tradition of scientific research.