UP ALOFT

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 17238, 19 April 1930, Page 5

UP ALOFT

LIFE ON TREE TOPS GUIANA WONDERS LONDON, April 7. A remarkable picture of life on the "roof" of a tropical rain-forest was given 10 nie ivosat umpire oooeiy oy .>.ajoi Hingston, leader of the Oxford biologica. expe,uiuoiL to bssequn.o, Js.lLi.Sli i.u.aiia, South America, last year. equipped wan a line-throwing gun, scaling ladders and poison syringes as it deteufce against venomous insects infesting tho trees, the expedition camped in a primeval torest on Hie buuKS of the River MorabaTii amid a. dense assemblage 01 tail, suaignl trees. Packed in riotous competition to get their heads into ihe roof, they stood, practically unchange. uiroiign me centuries, their trunks without a branch for the first 70ft, alter which, the foliage was intertwined into practically a solid root, beneath which die sun could not penetrate. Dismal darkness, incessant ram and saturated atmosphere, rendered dry clothes an impossibility. All the equipment, turned mildewy, skins and specimens rotted, but on the roof, 150 ft above, one, looked over a green plain rising and falling in hills and valleys amid an abundance of beautiful flowers and a wealth of animal and bird life. Tho naturalists collected thousands ot specimens and felled hundreds of trees for identification. They are now working out material for the British Museum and Kew Gardens.