Results of a Biological Survey of the San Francisco Mountain Region and Desert of the Little Colorado, Arizona |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
abundant altitude arctic areas arid Arizona Arvicola August balsam belt birds border Boreal Province Breeds cedar belt Chipmunk cisco Mountain Cocanini color Colorado Desert Crotaphytus Douglas fir Douglas fir zone dusky Ear from crown east Echo Cliffs fauna feet figs forest forms Francisco Mountain region Grand Cañon Grand Falls Hart Merriam hernandesi Hesperomys Hind foot inhabit Juniperus occidentalis Kendrick Peak Kennerly kilometers lava beds Lepus Little Colorado River Little Spring Locality mammals Mearns megalotis meters Mexico middle of September miles Mormon Lake Mouse National Museum Department O'Leary Peak Painted Desert Perognathus pine belt piñon belt plants plate range Record of specimens reptiles Rocky Mountains San Francisco Mountain seen Sept September 23 shot side skull Sonoran Sparrow species specimens collected Squirrel summit Tail vertebræ Tamias temperature timber line Tolerably common Total length trees Type U. S. National Museum Vernon Bailey Western Woodhouse
Popular passages
Page 9 - Eiver — the Colorado Chiquito of the Mexicans — and consequently is lowest at the north, its slope being away from the southern edge of the plateau. The river has cut its bed down to about 820 meters (2,700 feet) at the point where it empties into the Grand...
Page 22 - The season of reproduction for the plant, as for the animal, is the warm part of the year. After the period of reproduction the plant withers; after it flowers and fruits and matures its seed, it dies down or becomes physiologically inactive. And what the plant accomplishes in one way the animal accomplishes in another. To escape the cold of winter and its consequences, the sensitive mammal hibernates; the bird migrates to a more southern latitude; the reptile and batrachian dig holes in the mud...
Page 121 - The point of greatest significance, so far as the practical agriculturist is concerned, is that what is true of animals and plants in a state of nature is true also of animals and plants as modified by the voluntary acts of man ; for every race or breed of sheep, cattle, or swine, and every variety of grain or vegetable thrives best under particular conditions of temperature, moisture, exposure, and so on. It follows that a map of the natural life areas of a country will tell the...
Page 99 - Annotated list of reptiles and batrachians collected by Dr. C. Hart Merriam and Vernon Bailey on the San Francisco Mountain Plateau and Desert of the Little Colorado, Arizona, with descriptions of new species.
Page 15 - Mountain region, and the Groat Plains, which together constitute the so-called ' Great Central Province,'! of naturalists, 1 was astonished to be forced into the belief that no such province exists. Indeed, the present investigation demonstrates that there are but two primary life provinces in this country : a northern, which may be termed Boreal, and a southern, which, for our purposes, may be termed Sonoran, since it comes to us from Mexico through Sonora. In attempting to arrange all the life...
Page 9 - ... lowest stratum which comes to the surface is carboniferous limestone; above this is red sandstone, which in turn is overlaid by the so-called variegated marls or argillaceous clays, sometimes capped by a thin layer of impure coal or lignite. The limestone appears on the west side of the river only (?), where it is soon buried under the ancient lava floods from San Francisco Mountain and neighboring craters. The red sandstone is encountered everywhere, sometimes as surface rock, sometimes as high...
Page 100 - ... drainage systems, at least in the northern portion of the territory, and I do not believe that both will be found anywhere in the same locality. There can consequently be no doubt that both forms are subspecies of the same species, but whether the form now named for the first time should receive a trinominal appellation or not is quite another thing, depending, according to the code of zoological nomenclature adopted by the American Ornithologists...
Page 10 - River are strewn with chips aud pieces which have tumbled down during the wearing away of the hill-sides. Logs 30 to 50 centimeters (roughly, a foot or a foot and a half) in diameter and 9 to 12 meters (30 or 40 feet) in length are still common, and several sections were found, possibly from the same tree, which measured about 150 centimeters (5 feet) in diameter.
Page 17 - ... hence it is necessary to search the records of the past for the explanation. The period immediately preceding the present is known as the glacial age, because the northern parts of the globe were then buried in ice. This ice cap, which in places was several thousand feet in thickness, underwent two principal movements of advance and retreat, first crowding the life of the region far to the southward, then allowing it to return, to be again driven south by the next advance. The southern terminus...
Page 88 - ... go the males to their inviting winter haunts, to be followed not long after by the females and young. The latter — probably because they have less strength — linger last, and may be seen even after every adult bird has departed."* In the San Francisco Mountains, Arizona, Dr. Merriam found them "very abundant in the balsam belt and the upper part