Dec. 14 MX 175 Belar Carralán, Juchita de Juárez, Oaxaca, Mexico. Ottye Caride Adis, a recently graduated UNAM [illegible] student working with Oscar Flores, Pedro Fendón Legaspi, a plant collector, and I left Mexico City yesterday morning and drove to Oaxaca; spent night in Juchita de Juárez. This morning, drove to Santiago Comaltepec to ask for permission to collect. Talked with 2 people in the Comisariado de Bienes Comunales (Nictor M. Hernández Ortiz + Color L. López Flores); since the comisariado was gone. They told us that we either couldn't collect or could take 1-2 samples (they weren't sure). They sent us to talk to the agents in La Esperanza, who were gone when we got there. We decided to start sampling and drove to "La Halería," a first stop 11.0 km (by rd) from La Esperanza on MX 175, just before the turnoff to San Cristóbal. The forest all the way down MX 175 from Carralán to La Esperanza is in great shape, with only limited areas of human disturbance. This area has a path through cloud forest with some big trees, tree ferns, a fairly dense understory, and lots of bromeliads (including some huge ones). We started opening bromeliads at 12:00 and stopped at 13:30, opening perhaps 15 good ones. They didn't have much water in them, and the leaf litter was dry, as was the area under smaller logs. We got 6 Chiropterostylis pluriadiels and a Trichia out of bromeliads; and 2 Graugaster (saw several more on the ground). I think this is the same area where Ted collected Gyptrostylus adoxa. We then drove to San Pedro Yólo and met with the authorities, who gave us permission to collect + a place to sleep. We then drove back to La Esperanza and talked to the authorities, who had returned. They hadn't talked with Comaltepec, but gave us permission to work.