Alexander Grant Ruthven
Published: 2013-09
Total Pages: 36
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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1922 edition. Excerpt: ... has never visited it. It is reached by the trail leading out through Masinga. _ Palomina. An Indian village on the north slopes of the Sierras, on the river of the same name, and at an altitude of 5,000 feet (as given by Mr. Brown). There is a small hamlet on the coast at the mouth of this river which must not be confused with the Indian village at which Mr. Brown collected. I did not visit this locality, but according to all authentic reports which I have been able to gather it has been but slightly deforested, there being but a small area of savanna here. Pammo (see Chiruqua and Macotama). A word here as to just what is meant by a paramo may not be out of place. It is that portion of the high mountain ranges of the tropics which lies between timber-line and the snow-line or the crest of the range, as the case may-be, with a minimtun altitude of more or less than 10,000 feet, but varying considerably in different regions. In the eastern and central Andes of Colombia there exists a heavy temperate zone forest which extends up as high as I2, ooo feet in many places, but this forest is absent in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, where paramo conditions begin at about 10,000 feet. The lower parts of the paramo contain more or less of an abundance of small gnarled trees and shrubs intermingled with bushes and coarse grass, the greater the quantity of moisture present the more abundant the shrubbery. As' the altitude increases the gnarled trees disappear, the shrubs become more stunted, the bushes lower and tougher, while the grasses increase. Certain species of hardy little bushes persist to the very snow-line, as well as the Freilejon. Pueblo V iejv. A village whose inhabitants are entirely Colombians, ...