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A NATURALIST’S NOTES IN ECUADOR.


By Walter Goodfeelow.


(Continued from page ggj.


There is something particularly exciting to the naturalist

when he first plunges into a tropical forest, neither have I found

this feeling to wear off by repetition. Though it is by no means

in the forests only, that one finds a greater abundance of animal

life than elsewhere ; but still one is always expecting something,

aud the strange note of a bird unseen excites more curiosity

there than it might do under other circumstances. We used to

feel this especially after travelling for weeks among the cold,

barren Andes of Ecuador, where we were continuously at great

elevations, and to a somewhat lesser extent in Colombia where

the altitudes were not so high, and, therefore, the changes not so

striking. With what satisfaction we dipped down into deep

warm forest-covered valleys; where everything was full of the

exuberance of tropical life! Fresh flowers, fresh birds and

butterflies, and fresh sounds on every hand. One longed to

possess more eyes to take it all in. We would then throw aside

our warm “ponchos” which only a few hours before we had

found barely sufficient to keep out the cold winds, when after a

short, rapid, and steep descent, we were in a new region. These

valleys, so cut off from one another, are quite a feature of the

Andes, and especially of the southern parts of Colombia, and

present many interesting local forms in their ornithology. In

these restricted areas, animal life is of course much more con¬

centrated, and therefore appears much more abundant than in

the interminable forests of the Pacific coast, and of the

Amazonian region. There, one can go on for a whole day

without hearing the sound of a bird, or the chirp even of an

insect. I have never found any forests so silent and gloomy as

those leading down from the Eastern Andes to the headwaters

of the Napo ; for days we would not hear the voice of a bird

beyond occasionally the lovely song of the “ flautero.” I never

saw this bird, and don’t know to what species it belongs. It

seems difficult to believe it to be a small bird, but I was assured

it was by our Indian carriers. It is wonderful for such notes to

come from the throat of a bird ; even our wild-looking Indians

always seemed impressed by it, and would halt for a minute to

listen to the song.


Perhaps the period of the year had something to do with

the paucity of bird life on the higher Eastern side at the time of



