THE AUK: 



A QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF 

 ORNITHOLOGY. 



Vol. XXIX. April, 1912. No. 2. 



BIRDS OF THE PARAMO OF CENTRAL ECUADOR. 



BY SAMUEL N. RHOADS. 



Paramo is the name for the treeless zone of the Andean Moun- 

 tains which reaches from the lower border of perpetual snows to 

 the upper border of the tree line. This zone corresponds in western 

 Ecuador to the areas found between the elevations of 12,000 and 

 14,000 feet. It is wide or narrow according to the relative steep- 

 ness of the mountain sides between these elevations. While the 

 transition area between the lower Paramo and the upper tree and 

 bush line is more or less an interlocking of the two, and some 

 stunted trees are found in sheltered gorges far up into the typical 

 Paramo, there is no mistaking the region as soon as you near its 

 lower edge, after a strenuous climb through the diminishing forest. 

 You are then in the tussock-grass country. This tussock-grass, 

 and the numerous minor plants and shrubs which crop out among 

 it, feed numberless herds and droves of cattle, horses and sheep, 

 a chief source of revenue to the owners whose vast haciendas 

 often reach up, from the lofty tierra templada, five thousand feet 

 higher into the abodes of everlasting snow. 



Until the Andean traveler reaches the Paramo he can have no 

 right conception of the immense grandeur of the Andean chain 

 of the Cordilleras. Before that event he is so hemmed in by 

 narrowing gorges, by chain upon chain of foothills, or by suspended 

 oceans of vapor and clouds, that he begins to say in his heart, 

 "There are no Andes; Chimborazo is a dream and Cotopaxi pure 



141 



