AN ORNITHOLOGIST IN SOUTHERN MEXICO 



By ALEXANDER WETMORE 

 Assistant Secretary, Smithsonian Institution 



The connection between archeology, the ancient Maya, and modern 

 birds may seem remote. But in Matthew Stirling's camp for the 

 National Geographic Society-Smithsonian Institution Archeological 

 Expedition to Veracruz I found last spring pleasant quarters for 

 ornithological studies in a fascinating region. In Mexico City, 

 through Sehor Juan Zinser, then Jefe del Servicio de Caza of the De- 

 partmento Forestal y de Caza y Pesca, I received the necessary per- 

 mit to allow the collection of birds for scientific study, and in Vera- 

 cruz City through the courtesy of Gen. Alejandro Manje, Comandante 

 de la 26a Zona Militar en Veracruz, the proper papers authorizing 

 the bearing of arms for hunting. 



One is always impatient to be afield in new territory, and my com- 

 panion Richard Stewart, staff photographer of the National Geo- 

 graphic Society, and I felt that our expedition had only really begun 

 when on the morning of March 5 we left Veracruz on a combination 

 freight and passenger train for Alvarado. Tantalizing glimpses of 

 brown jays, cardinals more brilliantly red than the familiar friend 

 we knew at home, and other more obscure birds that I could not 

 identify from the car window aroused enthusiasm, as did the gulls, 

 pelicans, ducks, and cormorants seen from the steamer launch 

 Eustolita that carried us up the Rio Papaloapan to the fine old town 

 of Tlacotalpan. The following morning we were really on our way 

 when we embarked in the "canoa" La DclUniia with Pedro Baran, and 

 traveled through winding channels, many of them narrow and choked 

 with water hyacinth, until noon brought us to the landing at Boca 

 San Miguel. Our field outfit was soon loaded into an oxcart, and 

 after a 2-hour ride on muleback we reached the camp a mile beyond 

 the village of Tres Zapotes. 



The location was ideal for the ornithologist. The three palm thatch 

 houses of the camp were built on elevated ground above a small 

 savanna, with dense jungle at the side. The land was slightly un- 

 dulating, cut by small arroyos of clear water, and we looked out 

 from the houses across open pastures to the Yolcan de Tuxtla, with 

 the low slopes of Cerro Prieto and the distant peak of Volcan San 

 Martin in the distance. Farmers living in the village had cleared 

 considerable tracts which were planted in corn. Other sections where 



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