Ecology of Indonesian Papua Part One. Andrew J. Marshall
results. But, as I have indicated, it became more possible and efficient to sponsor individuals with specific aims, as Walter Rothschild had already done for some time before the war with Albert Meek in British New Guinea/Papua.
From the United Kingdom, Rothschild continued—albeit on a smaller scale—his sponsorship, with collections going to his museum at Tring. Meek’s associates and successors, the Eichhorns, continued in Papua until 1923 and then worked in New Britain until 1925. Unfortunately, by 1932 personal circumstances forced Rothschild to sell most of his bird collection to the American Museum of Natural History in New York—five years before his death. Before then, however, he was able partly to support the expedition of Ernst Mayr (see below) and his subsequent studies, and in 1928 also to initiate sponsorship for Fred Shaw Mayer, so launching a career which would last nearly forty years (the present author met him in 1966) with stays in New Guinea of varying duration.
The considerable collections of birds by Bürgers on the German Sepik Expedition of 1912–1913, worked up, as already noted, by Stresemann in Berlin and published in 1923, filled in many gaps but a number of questions remained—notably concerning some "mystery" birds of paradise and bower birds collected from time to time by plume hunters before 1920 but not seen since. This led to joint American, British, and German sponsorship for a medical student turned zoologist, the future evolutionist, prolific writer, and ultimate centenarian Ernst Mayr (1904–2005). While still under supervision by Stresemann, Mayr traveled both to western and eastern New Guinea in 1928–1929, collecting many birds (Tring and AMNH) and mammals along with insects (Berlin) and some plants (partly lost, with duplicates in Bogor), ranging from the Vogelkop Peninsula (Siwi, Momu, and Anggi Lakes) to the Cyclops Mts (to the summit), the Huon Peninsula (including the Saruwaged Range, following in Keysser’s and Lane-Poole’s tracks to the summit), and the Herzog Mts south of Lae, crossing into the upper Snake Valley. Mayr’s results led in 1930 to a significant suggestion by Stresemann—that the "mystery" birds were of hybrid origin.
Shaw Mayer’s early trips were for the Tring Museum, collecting birds and mammals. Contemporary localities included the Vogelkop Peninsula (1928), the Wey-land Mts (1930), the Huon Peninsula (1931), and the Milne Bay Islands (1935). Later he amassed the first major collections from the Central Highlands of present-day Papua New Guinea as these became accessible (BMNH), an activity continuing after World War II.
A number of other zoological collectors also were active in the 1920s and 1930s—again with American sponsorship now more in evidence. During the years to 1928, Goodfellow once more was in the field, in 1925 searching for vertebrates in southern Papua; T. Jackson was active around Merauke in 1920–1924 (birds, MCZ); while Wirz, in addition to his already-mentioned sojourn in the central mountains, visited some coastal areas in the early 1920s including swampy Frederik Hendrik (now Yos Sudarso) Island as well as Merauke in the south (animals, Leiden). Wirz, later established at Basel University, would undertake further, largely anthropological, trips over the next three decades, passing away in 1955 in the Maprik area. P. T. Putnam in 1927 collected amphibians and reptiles in the Merauke area (MCZ). L. S. Crandall and H. Hamlin in 1928 collected birds in the southeastern mountains (AMNH).
From 1928 to 1933, in addition to Mayr (see above) zoological collectors included C. T. MacNamara in 1928–1930 on Mt Lamington (southeast of Popondetta; Mt Lamington later underwent a Peléean eruption which in 1951 killed 3,000 people and destroyed vegetation over a considerable area), focusing on beetles (Sydney, Adelaide); the Rev. L. Wagner in 1929, collecting beetles at Lutheran stations at Finschhafen, Wareo, and Komba, and in the Cromwell Range (Adelaide); W. G. N. van der Steen in the same year in the upper Digul River (insects, Amsterdam); J. T. Zimmer (see above) over 1929–1931, collecting birds on the Fly River (AMNH); W. J. C. Frost, obtaining in 1930 birds on the Vogelkop Peninsula and some of the western Papuan islands (Batanta, Waigeo, and Salawati); Dr and Mrs G. Stein in 1931 in the Vogelkop Peninsula, Weyland Mts, and Yapen (birds and some plants, Berlin and Bogor); S. L. Brug in 1932 on the southwest coast and in the Aru Islands (mosquitoes, Amsterdam, BMNH); and Herbert Stevens in 1932–1933, obtaining birds, insects, herpetofauna, and a few mammals (MCZ) in the upper Watut basin—the first to do so in this famous gold mining region (visiting among other places Wau, Mt Missim, Bulolo, and Bulowat). On the marine front, W. J. Eyerdam collected shells and corals (AMNH).
In the Territory of Papua after 1935, Ivan Champion and C. T. J. Adamson, inspired by the concurrent Archbold Expeditions (by whom some aerial support was provided), collected animals on their 1936–1937 Bamu-Purari patrol through the Southern Highlands (including Lake Kutubu, first discovered in 1936). In 1938 there was a small Papuan-Australian Expedition (BMNH).
Returning to Dutch New Guinea, E. Jacobson was active in 1936 on Waigeo (around the same time as was Cheeseman; see below), making collections of birds and insects (Bogor); and, while on the Denison-Crockett expedition in the schooner Chiva to the Vogelkop Peninsula and Raja Ampat Islands in 1937–1938, S. Dillon Ripley (a future Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution) collected birds in the Tamrau Mts and on Salawati, Batanta, and Misool (Philadelphia). Ripley later wrote a popular account of his trip (Trail of the Money Bird, 1942), including observations of Rabaul not long after its Pompeiianesque devastation.
The 1930s also saw a renewal of independent entomological collecting in New Guinea, beginning in 1933 with the intrepid Englishwoman Evelyn Lucy Cheese-man, who over her several trips benefited from sponsorship by the British Museum (Natural History). She was the first extensively to sample for insects in many areas. Her adventures—including unwelcome obstructions on the part of Australian officialdom as well as long coastal journeys on foot—are related in a number of entertaining books: The Two Roads of Papua (on her 1933–1934 trip), Six-legged Snakes (on her 1936 tour, partly with W. Stüber; see below), and Land of the Red Bird (on her 1938–1939 trip).
In 1933–1934 Cheeseman collected insects at Kokoda, Orrori, and Oquali (on the north side of Owen Stanley Mts), Isurava (900 m), and at Mafulu (1,200 m), Mondo (1,500 m), Dieni (600 m), Mt Tafa (2,550 m), all on the southern fall of the Owen Stanley Mts. During part of that period she worked with the First Arch-bold Expedition (see above). In 1936 she collected briefly at Kavieng, New Ireland, but much more substantially around Hollandia (now Jayapura) with visits to the Bougainville Range (on the border) and particularly in the Cyclops Mts. In 1938– 1939 she worked on Waigeo Island and on Yapen, from there proceeding to Hollandia (and Humboldt Bay), then working in the Mandated Territory at Aitape (having largely walked from Hollandia!), the Torricelli Mts, the hills between Vanimo and Hollandia, and the Bewani Mts. Many species have been based on her collections (insects BMNH; 1939 collections from the Mandated Territory at Adelaide; plants BMNH, Kew, including cryptogams from 1936).
Other entomological collectors worked on the mainland of western New Guinea, the Raja Ampat Islands, the Geelvink (now Cenderawasih) Bay islands, and elsewhere under Dutch control in this decade. These collectors included Jacobson (see above); Lt J. M. van Ravenswaay Claasen (Berau Peninsula, Vogelkop, in 1937, and Mappia, the Digul River, Merauke, and Ayamaru (insects; Leiden) in 1938); R. G. Wind (butterflies and other insects in 1939 along the south coast including Fakfak, Merauke, etc., sold to various museums); and, from 1930, the settler and professional collector W. Stüber (in 1936 with Cheeseman) in the Hollandia (now Jayapura)-Sawia area and hills to the south and east, including Sentani, Krisa Road, Korime, Mamda, Ajiop, Tarafia (600 m), Kofio (Komfe) Hills, Vokwar, Njau, Bougainville Mts (400 m), Bewani Mts, Nonno (Japoe), Cyclops Mts, and the Pim River (insects, Bogor, Leiden, with particular attention to Odonata); he also collected orchids (see below).
In the Mandated Territory, a new center for entomological activity was established at Kerevat outside Rabaul in 1928 when the Department of Agriculture set up an experiment station. There, J. L. Froggatt, B. A. O’Connor, and Gordon Dun were entomologists, but their collections are now mostly destroyed. Also in New Britain, G. F. Hill collected mosquitos and other insects (Macleay; CSIRO). But that big island would, beyond the Gazelle Peninsula, remain largely unknown until after World War II; nor was there much activity in the rest of the Bismarck Archipelago.
In September 1939, World War II broke out and in May 1940, the Netherlands was overrun by Germany. In the two years before war arrived in the Pacific there was a final flurry of Dutch activities; these in particular improved knowledge of the poorly known Bomberai Peninsula. The Negumy