1952] 



PLANT HUNTING IN ECUADOR 



13 



as the sun came up, and from then on it was a mad scramble up the walls of the 

 canon and into the lateral valleys for certain choice things which we had not col- 

 lected before. That evening, just as the brief twilight slipped into darkness we 

 passed the 2,000 ft elevation, and later stumbled into the tiny village of Naran- 

 japata. There we bought full-fare railway tickets and, as is the custom and some- 

 times a necessity in Ecuador, hopped the first freight, strapped our heavy packs 

 of specimens and ourselves to the narrow runway on the top of a freight car, and 

 enjoyed the smoke and cinders during the wild, careening ride back to Huigra. 

 With this, we had begun to make real headway in our transect. 



The crew was willing but in no shape to plunge into another round of heavy 

 work, so I decided to return to headquarters for further rest and recuperation, and 

 also to sort and pack the specimens in napthalene B Some incidental collecting 

 also was done in the vicinity of Cuenca during that period. We returned to our 

 project of the western escarpment on July 4. Contact was made with the highest 

 vegetation zone worked in the previous period, and from there we collected onto 

 the paramo. 



Perhaps as a matter of some interest, the material of this botanical transect 

 of the western Andean escarpment was collected between elevations of 120 ft. 

 and 11,500 ft. It consisted of an excess of 1,000 numbers of which, where pos- 

 sible, a full set of duplicates were taken — usually six or more depending on the 

 nature of the material. Although by no means complete, these 1000-odd numbers 

 should give a fair sampling of the flora of the region at that time of year. 



We were now deep in July and I had wanted to see what the "winter" flora 

 might be like on the Paramo des Soldados, west of Cuenca. Bad weather had 

 postponed the trip several times. Finally we set out but were turned back from 

 our objective by a snowstorm. Rather than call the day a total loss, we tried a 

 small valley near the edge of the paramo. July 16, spent in the region of the tiny 

 glacial lake in the head of the valley of the Surucucho, is a memorable one for, 

 as we left the valley that night, our pack animals were laden with more than 550 

 specimens. This single day of collecting has been chronicled elsewhere (Jour. 

 N. Y. Bot. Gard. 47:25-31. 1946) and need not be detailed here. 



An opening with permanent employment and chances of advancement came to 

 Jorgensen He offered to stay with me for the remainder of my work, even on the 

 chance of losing the position, but I felt he should accept immediately. Although 

 we had a little farewell party it was not a very hilarious affair. 



THE CORDILLERA ORIENTAL 



With time running out on me a decision was necessary. There were so many 

 places which might be collected that it almost was a temptation to make a sort of 

 grand tour, skimming a few trophies as we went along. There was even a tempta- 

 tion to go into the region of Chimborazo and collect around this great snow en- 

 cased volcanic cone. It was decided otherwise. Almost every previous plant ex- 

 plorer had ascended this mountain and so I determined to turn elsewhere. Being 

 more accessible, both the western and central Cordilleras had been earlier ex- 

 plored by others. The eastern cordillera is botanically but little known except in 

 a relatively few areas — and these from rather scant materials. Furthermore, in my 

 work with the Misibn de Cinchona, I had long noted the botanical richness of the 

 sotobosque — that zone between the high forest of the humid regions and the tree- 

 less paramo. On the eastern cordillera the sotobosque often assumes the char- 

 acter of a true, high altitude "mossy forest. " As it breaks onto the paramo, the 

 sotobosque often becomes dwarfed and there is replete with shrubby forms and 

 herbaceous materials. Under the best of weather conditions this is a zone of 



