MICROLEPIDOPTERA OE NEW GUINEA 
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3700 meters (“Swampy alpine vegetation at the timber line”, according 
to Toxopeus, 1940); and Scree Valley Camp, at the foot of Mount Wilhel- 
mina, where most specimens were collected at 3800 meters, and other 
specimens during trips to regions ranging from 3400 to 4250 meters 
(“Alpine above timber line, shrubs in sheltered spots only”, loc. cit.). 
We will concentrate our attention on the two highest collecting stations, 
Letterbox Camp and Scree Valley Camp, and regard the environs of 
Lake Habbema only in connection with the other two. The last mentioned 
locality is not so decidedly “alpine” and its fauna has a too great resem- 
blance to that of the Moss Forest Camp, that dorado of Microlepidoptera 
(cf. above). Moreover it is rather remote from the other two localities and 
is 300 meters lower down. Lake Habbema Camp was far from poor: 
69 species of Microlepidoptera were collected there as against 23 and 27 
from Letterbox and Scree Valley Camps, respectively. For Luther parti- 
culars we refer to the list of all species collected , at the end of the systematic 
part. 
The material from the Letterbox and Scree Valley Camps amounts to 
44 species in total, all of them being new and endemic (except for one 
species of Isotenes represented by an unrecognisably rubbed specimen). 
They may be divided as follows: 
a. Belonging to 8 cosmopolitan or circumtropical genera: 10 species; 
b. Belonging to 14 other apoclemic genera: 23 species; 
c. Belonging to 8 endemic genera : 1 1 species. 
This material is scanty, of course, and consequently, the conclusions 
it allows are not very reliable; still the above data are suggestive. 
The first category: endemic species of widely distributed genera, forms 
one fourth of the collection from this region, a rather higher ratio than 
that encountered elsewhere. The conclusion seems obvious: the ability 
of this group to spread quicker, to penetrate through barriers and to 
accomodate themselves to new surroundings easier, were in their favour, 
and enabled them to reach the high and barren country from far and to 
obtain a foothold there. Of the ten species of this group three were found 
also in lower stations, especially in Lake Habbema Camp, seven were 
captured in the alpine zone only. 
The third category, that of the endemic genera, is low, relatively spoken. 
This group forms another fourth of the collection, and only two genera, 
Emmetrophysis and Orocliion, are endemic to the alpine zone. Of the 
eleven species belonging to the endemic Papuan genera, nine were captured 
only in the two camps in question and two also in collecting stations 
situated lower down. 
Half of the collection is formed by the second category, that of endemic 
species of apodemic genera other than circumtropical and cosmopolitan. 
In total 14 genera were collected, seven of which only in Letterbox and 
Scree Valley Camps, others also at lower stations. We shall consider these 
seven genera more closely. 
