NATURE’S TRANSFORMATION AT PANAMA 
peccary, armadillo, and the sloth on hill- 
tops unexpectedly converted into perma- 
nent islands, submerging the mud-flats of 
the herons and the ibis, driving the deer, 
the jaguar, the tapir, iguanas, and mon- 
ster snakes through the rising waters to 
less hampered retreats, and opening up a 
new and larger home for the swamp alli- 
gator and the stream-confined fish, it 
seemed a proper time to study and to at- 
tempt a record of these changes. 
While necessarily representing a tran- 
sient condition, where organic decay and 
the dispersal of wild life was epochal 
only in the sense of marking a definite 
break between the past and the present, 
yet im the very processes of transition 
there would be much of present interest 
and of possible future value. 
Gatun Lake, at a surface elevation of 
85 feet above the sea-level, is estimated 
to cover 164 square miles, and extends 
not merely over the previously existing 
swampy ground of the Chagres Valley, 
but it has risen so far above the floor of 
the lowlands as to extend for miles be- 
tween the hills, forming estuaries, la- 
goons, and ponds, turning rapid, unnavi- 
gable streams into deep, sluggish rivers, 
and converting hilltops into beautiful is- 
lands, some of them miles in length, while 
the thousands of acres of flooded and 
fallen timber, into which stretch or circle 
narrow necks of land, practically defy 
any accurate estimate of the so-called 
shore-line of the new lake. 
SHORES UNSURVEYED 
From what we could learn through in- 
quiry and exploration, no one knows the 
size, shape, or location of much of the 
partly submerged lands; nor can satis- 
factory surveys now be made at the wa- 
ter-line without cutting down possibly a 
hundred miles of dying trees and bushes. 
Even then a 5-foot fluctuation in the 
lake’s surface, as may be expected he- 
tween the dry and wet periods, will nec- 
essarily vary the superficial area of the 
lake and the lines of the shore to a con- 
siderable degree. 
Some day, however, the warm and 
ever-present waters will destroy the ob- 
structing forests, and then the heretofore 
half-shrouded lake will glisten, near and 
161 
far, in the tropic lights, while the sur- 
rounding shores, each bay and promon- 
tory, the islands big and little, will be- 
come defined by a new and permanent 
border of bamboo and other semi-acquatic 
growths. 
When, in the fall of rorr, the locks of 
the spillway at the Gatun dam were 
closed, so as to begin the flooding of the 
Chagres Valley for the first and final 
time, the immediate use of the then shal- 
low waters invited the coming of the 
gasoline launch and native dug-out. In 
the beginning this great dam, one and 
one-half miles in length and too feet 
wide at the summit, towered many feet 
above the incipient lake, greatly reducing 
the effect of the trade winds, while the 
numerous islands and projecting points 
gave additional shelter to all small boats 
returning against the wind. 
Fach week, but usually on holidays and 
Sundays, canal employees went down the 
lake on hunting trips, and an easy and 
safe return could be counted on. But on 
our arrival, early in 1914, the lake had 
risen to its full height; island after 
island and point after point had sunk out 
of sight forever, while the steady diur- 
nal winds of the Caribbean Sea, whirling 
across the narrow and now low crest of 
the embankment, brought the waves into 
life a few yards away, ever increasing in 
size in the long course down the lake. 
LIKE A WORK OF NATURE 
As one gazed across the broad expanse 
of water, with its ruffled surface, it was 
hard to realize that it was the recent 
creation of man or responding for the 
first time to the action of the tropic 
winds. 
On one occasion when coming to Gatun 
after gasoline the launch encountered a 
heavy head sea in mid-lake and the small 
pump was unable to keep the boat clear 
of the breaking waves, so that it nearly 
filled, putting the engine out of service, 
and we drifted back several miles into a 
dead forest in peril of being wrecked by 
a collision with some large, tottering tree 
or buried beneath a falling top brought 
down by the impact. 
Like most natives 
Hemisphere, the 
Southern 
of Panama, 
of the 
Indians 
