The Forgotten Planet is a science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 novel by Murray Leinster

Murray Leinster

Murray Leinster was a nom de plume of William Fitzgerald Jenkins, an award-winning American writer of science fiction and alternate history...

. It was released in 1954

1954 in literature

The year 1954 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Jack Kerouac reads Dwight Goddard's A Buddhist Bible, which will influence him greatly.*John Updike graduates from Harvard with a thesis on George Herbert....

 by Gnome Press

Gnome Press

Gnome Press was an American small-press publishing company primarily known for publishing many science fiction classics.The company was founded in 1948 by Martin Greenberg and David A. Kyle. Many of Gnome's titles were reprinted in England by Boardman Books...

 in an edition of 5,000 copies. The novel is a fix-up

Fix-up

A fix-up is a novel created from short stories that may or may not have been initially related or previously published. The stories may be edited for consistency, and sometimes new connecting material—such as a frame story—is written for the new novel. The term was coined by the science fiction...

 from three short stories, "The Mad Planet" and "The Red Dust", both of which had originally appeared in the magazine Argosy

Argosy (magazine)

Argosy was an American pulp magazine, published by Frank Munsey. It is generally considered to be the first American pulp magazine. The magazine began as a general information periodical entitled The Golden Argosy, targeted at the boys adventure market.-Launch of Argosy:In late September 1882,...

in 1920 and 1921 and "Nightmare Planet" which appeared in Science Fiction Plus in 1953.
The "forgotten" planet had been seeded for life, first with microbes and later with plants and insects.