MIOCENE PLANTS FROM SOUTHERN MEXICO. 
By Epwarp W. Berry, 
Of the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore. 
I am indebted to the Compafia Transcontinental de Petroleo for 
the collections described in the present paper. They were made by 
Dr. Bruce Wade from several localities in the vicinity of Palomares 
in the State of Oaxaca and near San Jose del Carmen in the south- 
eastern part of the State of Vera Cruz, on the Isthmus of Tehuan- 
tepec. He informs me that fossil plants are present at several ad- 
ditional localities, as for example Ixhuatlan and Tecuanapa, and 
that detailed collecting would probably yield from 100 to 150 species. 
It is much to be hoped that additional collections may become avail- 
able as the country is opened up by the various oil companies. 
The fossil plants described in the present paper possess unusual 
value despite their limited variety from the fact that they are con- 
tained in a shallow water marine series carrying an abundant fauna, 
and thereby afford opportunities for comparisons between the marine 
fauna so common throughout tropical America and the scattered 
florules described by the writer from Panama,'! the Dominican 
Republic,’ Costa Rica,? Venezuela, and Haiti. The types have been 
deposited in the United States National Museum. 
The Isthmus of Tehuantepec is a low saddle in the backbone of 
Central America, nowhere over a hundred meters above sea level 
and in marked contrast in this respect with the broken country 
lying to the immediate east and west. It is a region of many lagoons 
and flooded areas both along both coasts and in the interior. The 
climate is moist tropical with a mean temperature of about 70°. 
From September to February the winds are prevailingly northerly 
and hence cool, bringing rather continuous light rains. The so-called 
dry season extends over the months of March, April, and May, with 
1U.S. Nat. Mus. Bull. 103, pp. 15-44, pls. 12-18, 1918. 
2U.S. Nat. Mus. Proc., vol. 59, pp. 117-127, pl. 21, 1921. 
? Idem, pp. 169-185, pls. 22-27. 
4Idem, pp. 553-579, pls. 107-109. 
5 Idem, vol. 62, art. 14. 
No. 2465—PROCEEDINGS U. S. NATIONAL MUSEUM, VOL. 62, ART. 19. 
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