PROCEEDINGS OF THE CLUB 



Meeting of February 7, 1939 at the American Museum 

 OF Natural History 



The meeting of the Torrey Club was called to order at 8:15 

 P.M. by the President, Dr. Arthur H. Graves. Forty-four persons 

 were present. 



The president announced that the Club would have Dr. 

 W. E. Kearns as speaker at the meeting held at the American 

 Museum of Natural History on March 7, 1939. He also an- 

 nounced that the first field trip of the year will be held on 

 March 4 under the guidance of Miss Wiley. All people interested 

 in this trip will meet at 10 a.m. in room 207 of the School 

 Service Building of the American Museum of Natural History. 



No further business was transacted. 



The scientific part of the program consisted of an illustrated 

 lecture on the Vegetational Zones of British Guiana by Dr. A. C. 

 Smith of The New York Botanical Garden. An abstract by the 

 speaker follows: 



"As a member of the American Museum-Terry-Holden Ex- 

 pedition, the speaker had the opportunity to collect plants in 

 British Guiana in 1937 and the first part of 1938; subsequently 

 he collected under the auspices of the New York Botanical 

 Garden and collaborating institutions. The region visited was 

 the country drained by the upper Essequibo and Rupununi 

 Rivers, some weeks being spent in the Akarai and Kanuku 

 Mountains; except for small collections of the Schomburgks, 

 the area had been essentially uncollected. 



Of the four principal vegetational zones of British Guiana, 

 the rain forest is by far the most extensive, covering about 90 

 per cent of the country. This forest is not floristically homo- 

 geneous, but shows several types, each with one or more obvi- 

 ously dominant trees. The interior forest appears to be a pre- 

 climax of the Amazonian rather than the typical Guianan 

 forest, as shown by the presence of certain species and the 

 conspicuous absence of others. 



"The extensive Rupununi savannas make up another vegeta- 

 tional zone. This outlying section of the Brazilian Rio Branco 

 savannas is far from monotonous showing many various types 

 of vegetation depending upon soil and other factors. Perhaps 



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