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NATURALIST'S GUIDE TO THE AMERICAS 



but steep and fantastically shaped 

 limestone hills on the north coast, and 

 sterile eruptive hills in the interior; 

 they reach their highest altitude 

 between 1000 and 1300 ft., in the barren 

 but botanically interesting serpentine 

 hills near Holguin. Most of the land in 

 this hilly region as well as in the undu- 

 lated central part of Northern Oriente, 

 including the basin of Cauto river, is 

 planted with Sugar Cane. The Carib- 

 bean sea coast is fringed with large 

 swamps, the largest of these, Cienaga de 

 Birama, north of the Cauto mouth, and 

 Cienaga de Buey south of it. Approach- 

 ing these are low woods and shrubby 

 savannas, little disturbed and with a 

 great variety of palms. 



The two remaining systems of Oriente 

 mountains, the Sagua-Baracoa group 

 and the Sierra Maestra chain are the 

 most important in Cuba. 



Sagua-Baracoa 



The Sagua-Baracoa group, between 

 Mayari, Baracoa and Guantanamo is 

 geologically much older than Sierra 

 Maestra and perhaps the oldest of Cuba; 

 its flora is, according to Dr. Ekman, 

 distinct from that of all the other regions 

 of Cuba or neighboring islands. This 

 group is drained by the swift Toa river, 

 whose waterfalls, perhaps the biggest 

 of Cuba, are so little accessible that they 

 are nearly unknown. On each side of 

 this river are leagues of forests very 

 little inhabited. Toa river runs likely 

 a larger volume of water than the Cauto 

 (the largest river of Cuba), which 

 gathers the waters from the north slope 

 of Sierra Maestra. These Sagua-Bara- 

 coa mountains are usually girdled by 

 lower limestone sierras, which are 

 generally very steep and craggy, as for 

 instance, the famous Yunque de Bara- 

 coa. Damp forests, abundant in Manaca 

 palms, alternate with open pinelands or 

 nearly impenetrable thorn forests, the 

 so called "Charrascales." On the top 

 of the highest of these mountains, 

 Sierra de Cristal (4300 ft.), its first and 

 only explorer, Dr. Ekman, found an 

 amazing number of new and strange 



plants. According to Dr. Ekman, the 

 finest woodpecker of Cuba, the 

 "Carpintero real" (Campephilus bair- 

 dii}j is abundant on this mountain, 

 though exceedingly rare in other parts 

 of Cuba. Sierra de Moa and Sierra de 

 Nipe are each about 3250 ft. high. The 

 last, despite its low altitude, has a 

 flora so marvelously rich in endemic 

 species, that it has yielded over 400 

 plants new to science in the recent 

 years. The "Sabina" (Juniperus lu- 

 cayand), the noxious "Palmilla" (Bac- 

 tris plumieriana) , Carapa guianensis, 

 the splendid Spatheliae abound in these 

 mountains and rare ferns, orchids, 

 bromeliads, etc., are met with on every 

 step. The climbing bamboo (Arthro- 

 stylidium sarmentosum) is often border- 

 ing the tracks in the woods with long 

 garlands hanging from branches, and 

 sometimes the wayside is densely car- 

 peted with the beautifully flowered Be- 

 gonia Wrightiana. Rich as these moun- 

 tains are botanically, they are not less 

 interesting to the geologist. If any place, 

 in Cuba, should ever come into consid- 

 eration for a national reserve, it ought 

 to be this unique mountain, the Sierra de 

 Nipe. In caves of Cape Maisi cliffs, a 

 number of skeletons of Indian "Si- 

 boneyes," and also of Caribs who came 

 from the Lesser Antilles, have been 

 found by Dr. C. de la Torre. These 

 "Farallones" (vertical cliffs) are the 

 home of the finest Helix of the world 

 (H. picta), with its hundreds of vari- 

 eties of different colors. Not far away, 

 near Baracoa, other rare Helices (H. 

 imperalor), the largest Cuban species 

 and H. apollo have been discovered, 

 the first in Mata, the second on top of 

 Yunque de Baracoa. There is also the 

 elusive butterfly Chlosyne perezi; other 

 rare species of this order as Clothilda 

 cubana, Cydimon poeyi may be found 

 north of Guantanamo. South of this 

 town, near Caimanera Naval Station, 

 lives the wading bird Aegialitis nivosa 

 and the rare snail Pleurodonte emargi- 

 nata. Other rare species of snails, Brachy- 

 podella brooksiana and B. turcasiana are 

 in Monte Taurus and Monte Libano'near 



