ON THE TERRESTRIAL FAUNA OF THE ROSS-SEA AREA, ANTARCTICA (Preliminary report)

Working on the United States Antarctic Research Program (USARP) of the National Science Foundation in connection with the Bishop Museum project, in the southern summer 1961/62, I studied the terrestrial animal communities and their environmental relations in the area of the U. S. McMurdo Station (Ross I.), within the limits of accessibility by helicopters. The southernmost point reached in field work was the Plunket Point region at the head of the Beardmore Glacier, where elevations up to 3330 m were investigated (Anna Heights1) north of Mt. Nimrod, approximately 8515’S, 167°E. In this Plunket Point area, we could not find any sign of life 2 (see also fig. 2). Samples were taken especially in South Victoria Land from the coast to the innermost mountains adjacent to the ice cap to the west, roughly between Mackay Glacier in the north and Ferrar Glacier in the south (771’S to 77°56/S). We investigated at elevations up to about 2200 m, also in some places in the neighborhood of McMurdo (Dailey Is.; Cape Crozier, Cape Royds, etc.), and on Mt. Erebus, the only active volcano of Antarctica, up to its top (4040 ± 20 m). We spent about two months sampling the area and living in a tent. I was partly assisted by Keith A. J. Wise (Bishop Museum), and always in company with the pedologist Dr. Fiorenzo Ugolini (Rutgers University) who also was my good comrade on the ascent of Mt. Erebus (where on the descent we had a bad time with the crevassed areas under whiteout conditions). I also appreciated very much our pedological discussion. Measurements of microclimatic factors were made whenever possible in the camp sites, sometimes covering the whole range of 24 hours. The results are still in elaboration as well as the processing of the data on the population densities of the observed ecosystems and the determination of the collected materials. Two terrestrial ecosytems (and biocoenosis as their biotic part respectively) can be distinguished in the visited area of Antarctica : a) the ” Chalikosystem ” and b) the ” Bryosystem.