THE U6KAKY Of THE SEP 13 1941 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS ZOOLOGICAL SERIES OF FIELD MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY Volume 24 CHICAGO, AUGUST 30, 1941 No. 21 THE HERPETOLOGICAL FAUNA OF THE SALAMA BASIN, BAJA VERAPAZ, GUATEMALA BY KARL P. SCHMIDT CHIEF CURATOR, DEPARTMENT OF ZOOLOGY j AND L. C. STUART RESEARCH ASSOCIATE, MUSEUM OF ZOOLOGY, UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN Although the plateau of Guatemala, the Pacific coast, and the mountains of Alta Verapaz have received considerable attention from herpetologists both in the past and again more recently, the arid interior basins and the desert of the upper Motagua River valley have remained almost untouched. This is surprising when one con-siders the fact that here lies a large area of tropical desert hemmed in on all sides by cloud forests, high plateaus, and tropical rain for-ests, and constituting, as it does, a biotic province of considerable extent and importance. Stejneger's description of Ctenosaura palearis (1899, p. 381) from Gualan in the Motagua Valley has long afforded a suggestion of distinctive faunal elements in this region. Recently both authors have visited these areas and have been fortunate enough to secure two small collections from the Salama Basin, one of the largest of the chain of interior desert basins lying north of the Motagua River. Although these collections are not rich with respect to either species or individuals, they are of considerable importance when viewed in the light of our lack of information on those regions, and the following report is presented as a study of a spe-cial area, probably typical of the isolated desert basins extending from San Geronimo in Baja Verapaz westward to Sacapulas in El Quiche". The first collection was assembled by Mr. Emmet R. Blake in April, 1934, when he visited Salama as a member of the Mandel Guate-malan Expedition of Field Museum of Natural History under the direction of the senior author, and the second was made in July, 1938, by the junior author when he was carrying on investigations under No. 499 233 . iDrf.v | 1 J i _ ] T 1 1 I V " Mfitural
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