Page 97 - Early Naturalists of the Black Range

Snow in 1891.
Writing about Walnut Canyon, Snow noted that “Here were found a considerable number of forms previously known to occur only in Arizona and old Mexico.” (p. 65). He also provided some insight into the collecting experience: “. . . note that the season was a very dry one, there being hardly enough rain, except on one occasion, to thoroughly wet the canvas of our tent in the Walnut creek canon during a stay of five weeks. The bed of the creek was dry for long distances. Collecting "at sugar" was rewarded by very indifferent success. Some fine beetles and moths were taken "at light," by making huge fires of pitch- pine logs. Among these were Plusiotis gloriosa, Plusiotis Lecontei, Orizabus Snowi, Strategus cessus, Aphonuis clunalis, and Cyclocephala manca. Lachnosterna longipilis was taken at dusk while flying about the foliage of the live-oaks. The only specimen taken of Chalcolepidius Webbii was a large female resting upon an old pine stump. The electric lights at Silver City were very attractive to insects. Here were taken Sphinx Elsa, Halisidota pura, Smerinthus occidentalis, a magnificent Daritis, Dynastes Grantii, and other fine species of both Lepidoptera and Coleoptera. Dendrobias quadrimaculatus, Clerus Spinolce, and Macrobasis ochrea were found abundantly upon the blossoms of the tall species of yucca in the vicinity of Deming and Silver City.” (p. 69)
Snow discovered more than 200 species of insect during his career.
Charles H. Marsh
Marsh performed his observations in and around Silver City from 1883 - 1886, publishing many reports. He was primarily an ornithologist and a professional collector. Hubbard (see link below) notes that he obtained the second skin and recorded the third record of Ferruginous Hawk in New Mexico on November 8, 1884, near Hurley in Grant County. (“The 19th and early-20th century status of the Ferruginous Hawk, with emphasis on that in New Mexico and adjacent states”, John P. Hubbard.)
Hubbard and Carla Dove have written on Marsh’s collecting activities in “Our Reevaluation of a Worthen’s Sparrow and Three Other Anomalous Specimens From Charles H. Marsh’s 1884-1886 Collections of Birds From Southwestern New Mexico.”
From The Naturalists’ Directory of 1884 Edward Drinker Cope
Mining in the west has a nasty reputation. That reputation was well deserved in the case of Lake Valley. The mines at Lake Valley were owned by the Sierra Grande Mining Company. Whitaker Wright established the holding company and increased his wealth immensely by selling $5 million in shares in his company all over the world. It is reported that the Sierra Grande Company was paying out $100,000 a month in dividends at this time. His business practices were based on misleading and often fraudulent information. He died a rather dramatic death, taking cyanide in a London courtroom rather than going to prison for fraud.
Good can be in the eye of the beholder, and sometimes “good” comes from dastardly deeds. Starting in the 1860’s, the great bone war broke out between Edward Drinker Cope (who is one of America’s great paleontologists and a person who kept one of the largest private collections of fossils at the time) and Othniel Charles Marsh, another of America’s great paleontologists. The
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