Growth of Reptile Collections 83 



Tropical Research Station in British Guiana; while about 500 

 specimens were collected on an expedition to the Huachuca 

 Mountains, Arizona. 



Such rapid building up of the collections is of vital import- 

 ance, because all research — taxonomic, distributional, or mor- 

 phological, as well as all exhibition, is based on the collections. 

 The department, being still considerably under ten years of 

 age, differs from the other departments of the institution, many 

 of which are a half century old, in having relatively meager 

 and inadequate reference material. Attention must be cen- 

 tered on building up this material for several years before the 

 department will be in a position to do its most efficient and 

 authoritative work. 



Constructive work on the catalogues and collections, out- 

 side that covered in course of the various lines of research in 

 progress, includes identification of all West Indian material, 

 of the collection of Nicaraguan lizards, and of the large 

 amount of North American live material received during the 

 summer months. A new tray system of storage has been in- 

 augurated by which accumulation of dust on the collections is 

 avoided and the species of a given genus are kept and handled 

 together. 



Considerable attention has been given to the department's 

 osteological collections. The salientian skeletons now number 

 98 (28 genera and 58 species), three-fourths of which have 

 been prepared by the Schultze technique during the present 

 year. It is possibly the largest collection of salientian skele- 

 tons in America as regards the number of different forms. It 

 appears to be second only to that of the British Museum 

 (which possessed in 1916 about 200 specimens of about 50 

 different genera), and to supplement that collection in includ- 

 ing a number of genera not represented there. Dissections of 

 lizards, representing many species of 12 iguanid genera, to 

 show hyoid and shoulder girdle have been prepared in connec- 

 tion with the work on Lower California and the Southwest. 

 Ten lizard skulls have been prepared. In connection with the 

 research on the myology and osteology of lizards a consider- 

 able series of skeletons suitable for exhibition is in preparation. 



