The Oologist. 



Vol. XXXIV. No. 6 



Albion, N. Y., June 15, 1917. 



Whole No. 859 



Owned and Published Monthly, by R. M. Barnes, Albion, N. Y., and Lacon, III. 



Bird Collecting in Eastern Colombia 

 By Paul G. Howes 



The Columbian expedition of 1913 

 sent out by the American Museum of 

 Natural History consisted of six mem- 

 bers. Mr. Frank M. Chapman, Louis 

 A. Furetes, George K. Clierrie, T. M, 

 Ring, G. M. O'Connell and the writer. 

 Its purpose was to make a survey of 

 the ornitliological fauna of tlie Bogota 

 region, from whence hundreds of skins 

 of birds had been collected in the past 

 by native collectors. These skins ar- 

 rived at the museums of the country 

 bearing very inaccurate data. The 

 locality "Bogota" meaning anywhere 

 within several hundred miles of that 

 place to the native collectors, it may 

 be readily seen how valueless these 

 specimens really were. Birds from 

 the river valley, birds from the hills, 

 and birds from the higher altitudes 

 were all labeled Bogota regardless of 

 the exact localities from which they 

 were collected. To straighten out 

 some of the ranges and other orni- 

 thological questions of the region was 

 the true purpose of this, and several 

 other expeditions which have been 

 sent into the jungles and mountain 

 ranges of Colombia. 



Collecting was begun in the Magda- 

 lena valley and pursued at a number 

 of stations across the eastern Andes 

 through Bogota to Villavicencio at 

 their eastern base. Some 2300 speci- 

 mens were secured representing over 

 500 species, a number indicating the 



remarkable richness of the avifauna 

 of the region. 



The following notes are presented 

 just as they were written from day to 

 day in the authors note books and, it 

 is hoped, will prove of interest to the 

 readers of the Oologist. 



The expedition sailed from New 

 York on January 8th via the United 

 Fruit Line steamship Zacapa. By the 

 second day out the weather became 

 so warm that we were able to sit out 

 all day upon the deck with no hats or 

 coats; a most agreeable change from 

 the damp, foggy January weather so 

 characteristic of the eastern states. 

 The presence of the gulf stream was 

 marked by large masses of vivid yel- 

 low seaweed, sometimes in big round- 

 ed patches, but more often extending 

 in long narrow lines across the steam- 

 ers bow. Fishing some up with a 

 grapple from the bow, I found that it 

 contained numerous little crabs, pro- 

 tectively colored, together with numer- 

 ous other forms of sea life, which 

 formed little isolated worlds floating 

 in the sea. 



On January eleventh, the weather 

 became very warm, even hot towards 

 noon and large numbers of flying fish 

 were noted sailing over the waves for 

 a few yards and then dropping back 

 into the water. One of them, caught 

 by the wind landed upon the deck and 

 an examination showed that the tail 

 was much longer on the lower side 

 than on the upper. This extention is 



