Botanists Seeking
p. 60 · Read in the full issue
A N. Guinea
Link With Indonesia
From Our Own Correspondent P. MORESBY, March 20.
ANOTHER Archbold Expedition is in the Territory—the fourth in the New Guinea area since 1925. The three members of the ex pedition (Mr. L. J. Brass, a bot anist; Mr. Robert M. Van Deusen, a mammalogist; and Mr. Geoffrey M. Tate, collecting zoological speci mens), will work in the eastern part of Papua, including the D’Entrecas teau Islands.
They will make a collection of plants and animals for the Ameri can Museum of Natural History and the Arnold Arboretum of Har vard University. The Arboretum already has one of the best collec tions in the world of New Guinea plants, but very little from the Eastern Papua region.
Mr. Brass commented when pass ing through Port Moresby that some of the most valuable early German collections had been lost (destroyed or looted) when the Rus sians entered Germany during the war.
In addition to collecting speci mens, the expedition will make a general survey of the flora and fauna of the area, and a study of
the geographical distribution of plant and animal life.
The scientists will try to estab lish the relationship of the flora and fauna with that of the rest of Malaysia—Dutch New Guinea, Mal aya and the East Indies.
The Expedition is starting its work in the Cape Vogel area. It will then move back into the moun
tains, and then across to the D’Entrecasteau Islands. The head quarters is to be Samarai.
Mrs. G. Nevill, wife of the Resi dent Commissioner of the Cook Islands, returned to Rarotonga per Maui Pomare in April after vaca tion in New Zealand.