THE NEOTROPICAL REGIONS 277 



means of stout hooked thorns, which earn for them such popular 

 names as " devil's fish-hook," "cat's claws," etc. The rattans of 

 the eastern tropics are replaced by a genus, Desmoncus, which 

 like its eastern relatives, is dreaded by the explorer in the forest, 

 where its barbed-wire entanglements are a formidable obstacle. 

 Like the eastern rattans, the prolonged leaf-axis is armed with 

 recurved claw-like spines. 



Epiphytes of many kinds abound in the equatorial forest. 

 Among the most notable are many aroids, and species of Cyclan- 

 thaceae, the latter looking like small palms, and confined to the 

 American tropics. These, as well as some of the Araceae, develop 

 thick, pendent aerial roots, which hang down like plumb-lines, and 

 may sometimes reach the ground. Aerial roots are also common 

 in epiphytic orchids, but as a rule are too small to attract attention. 

 Many aroids climb up the trunks of the trees by means of the 

 aerial roots, and the leaves of some of them are of gigantic size. 



While epiphytes are developed to a remarkable degree in the 

 high forest, they are often quite invisible from below, as they 

 grow far aloft in the crowns of the trees. 



The Cyclanthaceae, referred to above, have terrestrial species 

 as well, among them the species of Carludovica from whose leaves 

 are manufactured the Panama hats. 



Another peculiarly American family, the Bromeliaceae, also 

 largely epiphytes, includes the pineapples, and the "Spanish 

 moss" of our Gulf States. The family is very abundantly rep- 

 resented throughout tropical America, most of them resembling 

 the pineapple in habit. Some have showy flowers, or the inflores- 

 cence is surrounded by brightly colored leaves. 



Epiphytic orchids are common, but are less conspicuous than 

 in the mountain forest or the lower and more open forest of the 

 caatinga. Small epiphytic peppers (Peperomia spp.) are also 

 abundant, and the scarlet Aeschynanthus of the Malayan regions 

 is replaced by related, but different genera of Gesneraceae. 



Strangling figs, like those of the eastern tropics, occur in the 

 Amazonian forest, but are less common than in the Andean region, 

 and some other parts of tropical America. 



In the dark virgin forest the herbaceous undergrowth is scanty: 

 but in the lower wet forest there is a rank growth of ferns, Araceae, 

 Scitamineae (bananas, gingers, arrow-root, etc.). These are 



