﻿200 MERRILL. 



1,200 feet on the ridge between the Alag and Binabay and at about 5 or 

 6 miles from the nearest Tagalog settlements, one finds traces of the 

 Mangyans in clearings, occupied or deserted. It is the custom of these 

 people to clear a given area, by chopping down the trees and brush and 

 after burning it over they plant upland rice, corn, and other crops. Such 

 clearings will be occupied for one or more years until the soil shows 

 signs of exhaustion, until the slopes are denuded by erosion or until the 

 exuberent tropical vegetation becomes too great an obstacle to the 

 primitive agriculturist. He then clears another piece of ground and the 

 deserted one soon reverts to its former forested condition. After a term 

 of years the same land may be cleared again by the same methods. Every- 

 where on the more gentle slopes from the Binabay Biver to an altitude of 

 3,500 feet on Halcon, we observed clearings in all stages, from those 

 freshly cut and not yet burned to those in cultivation, and from those 

 recently deserted to clearings in all stages of reversion to forest. Some 

 of these were very extensive and must have entailed a great amount 

 of labor, for many of the trees felled were 3 feet in diameter, and the 

 only tools possessed by the Mangyans are working bolos and very small, 

 narrow axes. 



From a forestry standpoint, practically all the forests in the im- 

 mediate vicinity of Halcon have been ruined by the above methods of 

 clearing, for it seems evident that the Mangyan selects virgin woods for 

 his work of destruction, doubtless because he has found from experience 

 that the soil is better than in those localities where he has previously 

 cleared and which have reverted. 



The floristic conditions 10 of the lower forests indicate high and con- 

 tinuous humidity, shown by the numerous ferns, mosses and epiphytes. 

 As higher altitudes are reached these epiphytes become progressively more 

 abundant, until on the exposed crest-line ridges, beginning at 4,000 feet, the 

 trees are found to be completely covered with a dense mass of mosses and 

 epiphytes, so thick and close that frequently the bark of the tree is not 

 visible. The character of the vegetation entirely changes, the constituent 

 species of the lower forests disappear and others totally different in aspect 

 take their place. Various species of oak and one species of maple are 

 abundant at intermediate altitudes, but on the ridges the vegetation is 

 largely characterized by certain species found in such habitats throughout 

 Malaya. Epiphytic ferns and orchids and other plants become more 

 plentiful and there is a greater diversity in species; mosses are much 

 thicker and more luxuriant, enwrapping even the branches and branchlets 

 of the trees and forming a deep, soft, soil cover, frequently a foot in 

 thickness. Epiphytic shrubs and vines are abundant and give an added 

 character to the vegetation ; rhododendrons, huckleberries, raspberries and 



10 For an account of the Flora of Mount Halcon see Merrill, this Journal 

 C. Botany (1907), 2, 251. 



