Department of Zoology 



Research and Expeditions 



Peru, Colombia, the Atlantic off Surinam (Guiana), the United 

 States, Egypt, Nepal, and Malaya — each was the scene of activities 

 by staff members, and also an expedition in Colombia was made by 

 a nonstaff member. Despite the demands of specialization that 

 dictate that most of a field worker's attention be given to his 

 specialty, usually at least some additional material is secured. 



South America. Peru: Curator Emmet R. Blake carried on 

 field work (June-November 1958) in the Amazonian lowlands east 

 of the Andes in the southeastern part of the country, where he 

 traveled on the Rio de Madre de Dios (see pages 22 and 40) and 

 made the first sizable collection of birds (1,046 specimens) from the 

 area. Colombia: Field Associate Frederick J. Medem (of Instituto de 

 Ciencias Naturales, Bogata, Colombia) sent us a small but important 

 collection of mammals. Kjell von Sneidern (of Popayan, Colombia) 

 collected mammals and some birds for us in the little-known south- 

 western part of Colombia (see page 40). Atlantic off Surinam 

 (Guiana): Again this year Curator Loren P. Woods participated in 

 co-operative field work with the United States Fish and Wildlife 

 Service on the research vessel Oregon (August-September 1958) in 

 continuation of similar work in the equatorial western Atlantic in 

 1957 (see page 40). Before these collections were made, the offshore 

 fauna of these regions was unknown. The combined fish collections 

 that came to us from the dredging done on these trips (some 5,580 

 specimens) represent numbers of undescribed species, range exten- 

 sions, and material for comparison with specimens from the Caribbean 

 as well as provide a basis for study of the fishes that occur there. 



United States. Illinois: Associate Curator Henry S. Dybas 

 made a field trip to southern Illinois (see page 40) to collect from leaf 

 litter the minute beetles of the family Ptiliidae (feather-wings) for 

 his long-range study of this group. Curator Rupert L. Wenzel made 

 a number of short trips to the nearby Indiana dunes to collect certain 

 living beetle material for anatomical studies. Iowa: Curator Woods 

 made a two-day field trip in Iowa to work in co-operation with the 

 annual collecting trip of the John G. Shedd Aquarium (Chicago) and 

 with the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. Specimens were 

 collected for the Museum's reference collection, some large speci- 

 mens were selected to be made into skeletons, and photographs of 

 some species were taken for a forthcoming handbook on local fishes. 



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