700 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXIX. No. 748 



membership in the national scientific so- 

 cieties -which require research work as a quali- 

 fication. 



The compilation of the new edition will of 

 necessity involve much labor, but this will be 

 materially lightened if men of science will 

 reply promptly to this request. 



J. McKeen Cattell 



G.A.KBISON-ON-HUDSO]Sr, N. Y. 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS 

 The Biota of the San Bernardino Mountains. 

 By Joseph Grinnell. University of Cali- 

 fornia, Publications in Zoology, Vol. V., 

 No. 1. Pp. 170, plates 24. December 31, 

 1908. 



As a contribution to the zoology and botany 

 of southern California, Mr. Grinnell has given 

 us a paper based on three summers' field work 

 in the San Bernardino Mountains. Its prin- 

 cipal sections' are : " Life Zones of the Re- 

 gion," with lists of characteristic species of 

 plants of each zone ; " Descriptions of Locali- 

 ties," with special reference to their zonal 

 positions ; " General Considerations relating 

 to Bird Population; a List of the Important 

 Plants," largely trees and shrubs, with notes 

 on their distribution ; " A List of 139 Species 

 of Birds," with detailed notes on distribution, 

 breeding, food and other habits; " A List of 

 35 Species of Mammals," with notes on dis- 

 tribution, abundance and habits ; and " A List 

 of 20 Reptiles," lizards, horned toads and 

 snakes, with notes on range and habits. 



It is a great satisfaction to find a fellow 

 worker in the field of geographic distribution 

 who, instead of discovering at once new laws 

 and naming new distribution areas, accepts 

 and follows with conscientious care the gen- 

 eral principles of distribution governing the 

 transcontinental life zones and their subdi- 

 visions, as worked out by the U. S. Biological 

 Survey. Even the color scheme of the biolog- 

 ical survey zone map is followed, with one 

 exception, which is possibly accidental or the 

 fault of the lithographer. This exception 

 consists in using red, which is usually applied 

 to Tropical zone, for Lower Sonoran, which 



should have been orange. The colors of the 

 higher zones, yellow for Upper Sonoran, 

 blue for Transition, and green for Boreal, are 

 standards so long in use as to have become 

 familiar to many. Uniformity in such de- 

 tails is helpful to all who use zone maps. 



In reviewing a work of such general excel- 

 lence, and with so few faults, it seems un- 

 gracious to attack the first word in the title, 

 but to many of us, either of the long familiar 

 expressions fauna and flora, or plants and 

 animals, or for brevity just life, would have 

 sounded as well and meant as much as hiota. 

 However, as this term has been used before, 

 the author escapes the graver criticism of in- 

 troducing an unnecessary Greek substitute for 

 a good English expression. 



The use of the name tamarack, or tamarack 

 pine, for the lodge pole or Murray pine 

 (Pinus murrayana) , while often used locally 

 where there are no tamaracks, grates on the 

 nerves of those brought up among the real 

 tamaracks {Larix), as well as those to whom 

 the name lodge-pole pine recalls camps on the 

 borders of beautiful mountain meadows or the 

 sharp cones of slender tepee poles in the 

 camps of Cheyenne, Arrapahoe, Blackfeet, 

 Crow and Sioux. It may not be possible to 

 correct local misuse of names, but why extend 

 it? 



An evident error in the zone map consists 

 in extending Transition zone to the upper 

 limit of Pinus jeffreyi instead of confining it 

 to the limits of Pinus ponderosa, Pinus lam- 

 hertiana, Libocedrus decurrens, Quercus cali- 

 fomica and the accompanying set of plants 

 and animals. As a result the zone is extended 

 in places at least five hundred feet too high, 

 and the Canadian zone above is correspond- 

 ingly narrowed. This has apparently re- 

 sulted from a failure to clearly discrim- 

 inate between Pinus ponderosa and jeffreyi 

 and therefore to crediting them with the 

 same range (p. 31). Pinus jeffreyi in the 

 San Bernardino, San Jacinto and Sierra 

 Nevada Mountains ranges generally 500 to 

 1,000 feet higher than ponderosa, and by just 

 this much overlaps the lower edge of Canadian 



