131 Purosa was a mixed rain forest almost identical with the type we are camped in. Tuesday, September 29. Drizzling rain began sometime between 3-4 a.m. and continued until after eight. Thereafter almost completely overcast. No more rain. A chill breeze down valley this evening. My routine was so much disrupted by yesterday's outing that I had to spend most of today in camp on collections. Spent an hour down the road, and sent the boys out from 3 to 5. Mammal dept. busy on the bats of Ilaf o. A second native cat trapped with a meat-baited steel. Wednesday, September 30. One of the few early mornings here without mist; clear and snappy, temperature perhaps 51-52 (Forgot to look at the thermometer). Day almost completely overcast after about 8 a.m.; brief spell of sunshine; no rain. Had John drive me along the Okapa road about 2 miles to where the forest ends. From there walked back about a mile, first on top of the ridge which rises to about 100-150 ft. above the road thereabouts. Ridgetop forest a mixed rain forest at first; on the highest parts (c. 2050 m) Castanopsis forest. A big old native path, now out of use and growing over in places, ran along the top of the ridge. On the edge of the path, and perhaps planted there, were 2 Araucaria cunninghamii 9-12 inches in diameter and a Papuacedrus of somewhat smaller size. Have not seen these two conifers elsewhere in the area, although 2 Podocarpus spp. -- one scale-leaved and like pilgeri, the other aff. neriifolius but leaves very dark green -- are fairly common in the forest and grow to very large size. We are constantly aware of rather unexpected lowland or lower altitude elements in this camp area. Today I took from my arm, and pickled, a fair sized brown leech. We had scrambled scrub hen (megapode) egg for breakfast, and I have often heard the call of this bird at camp level and above, though its nesting mounds have not been seen by me. One egg was ample for the three of us. Plants in this category have been mentioned previously. In mammals the most striking is perhaps Euromys caudimaculatus. In herps, a bout a dozen snakes of several spp. have been brought in by natives. Altitude records can seldom be established on native collections. The bottom of the Purosa valley, however, can not be more than 6-8 hundred feet below camp level. Thursday, October 1. Return to early morning mist, clearing between 8 & 9. Fairly sunny day; no rain. Did some more botanizing along the top of the ridge (on the road) this side of yesterday's area. A morning of hard axe work for my boys. Collected several fair sized trees including a red-flowered Hibiscus which attains very large size, and a yellow flowered member of the Myrtaceae which most likely is a Tristania. All along the high ridge crest, in both mixed rain and pretty pure Castanopsis forest, is a red-flowered gesneriad, climbing to a few feet on tree trunks and sometimes prostrate on the ground, which would be an acquisition to U.S. hothouses, but of which I can find no mature seeds. Van now has, snared on tree trunks by Purosa natives, a russet Melomys new to the collection. Also the end of the tail of a bandicoot from a steel trap set by Tobram far down in the valley below camp.