550\ 0Ss-S3

eratures ranged from 14 to 16° F. agriculturewas
out of the question at these low temperatures. Even
the sheep herders choose to remain below 10,000.
With Little or no interference by man, theextremely
high country is primitive and virgine

There are two zones in Guatamala which suit
me best; ong as above noted and the other extreme-
the lowland jungles. The intervening country has been
developed for agricultural purposes and, of course, not
suited to my needs.

fhe high country which is called the Alta
Vera Paz-is a high and continuous area above 10,000 ft.
with many large islands above 11,000 feet. The savan-
nas of the high Uintas and the Kaibab are comparables.
As these areas have not been explored, I am not surpris-
ad to find new animal life there. With seven stations
a@ transect has been made from the north side of the
Sierra del los Guchmatones toa the south side of this
critically important range of high mountains. I have
over 300 skins, several skeletons and many birds from
the area. When we arrive at Guatamala ‘ity we will
spend mucho tiempo there.

It is interesting to sompare the ‘altos’,
cloud forests and pine forests. in the cloud forest,
the wind seldom blows. When it does it is of a sporadic
nature. xcept for the many birds which sing or
call continually, the forest is silent. It is always
cold except in the sunshine, which, because of the
many trees, seldom remains trained on one for more
than @ few minutes at a time. at night, the silence
is ocassionally broken by a falling limb or creak of
a tree. These forests are like the dense rain for-
ests of the northwest U.S.-/ashington-Cregon and like
those areas, have largs trees-some 10 feet in diam-
eter with the logs and trees covered with mosses and
lichens and many eriphytes growing from the branches.
In many respects the lichens and wosses are like those
of the artic.

In the pine forests the winds seems to blow
contimally and the soft murmur of the trees has a
soothing effect. The birds or at least those that
‘sing are few in mumber compared to the cloud for-

ests. In the high country, the winds are erratic
and harshe

Of all the ‘wildlife’ in Guatamala, the
people are the most interesting-in one way or anoth-
er. The further one penetrates the backward areas
the more one finds the natives have the impression
that I am a communist. I don’t think these peoples
have been brot up to date on the change of their
government. fo date, they have broken two windows,
scratched the car, written ten words of communism
on the car, stole 150 traps, 2 flash light and any
thing else they could get their hands on.