1. ENTOMOL So c BRlT COLUMBIA 93. DECEMBER 1996 A survey of grassland and montane arthropods collected in the southern Okanagan region of British Columbia.

The arthropods of the Osoyoos- Mt. Kobau area (11 9 ° 40 ' W, 49 ° OS ' N) in the southern Okanagan valley of BC were surveyed in the summer of 1991. Mt. Kobau is a high ridge with south-facing slopes covered in grassland and sagebrush from valley bottom to summit. A variety of insect traps and active collecting techniques was used to obtain the greatest poss ible diversity of arthropod species in the samples. Collections were made in a roughly vertical transect of Mt. Kobau from 300m at Osoyoos to the summit at 186 1 m. Eighty-eight samples were sorted to select the greatest number of taxa poss ible. A total of 5566 specimens was prepared for identification and of this, 5023 were identified to species (or morphospecies) by March, 1994. We collected at least 1101 species, including 12 new distributional records for Canada, 15 new di stributions for BC, 30 possible new records for Canada and 14 possible new records for BC, 2 new spccies, and 84 specics considcred rare, restricted or potentially endangered. Most of the rare species and records were found at low elevations and are typIcal of deserts and arid sagebrush grasslands of the Great Basin and Columbia Plateau to the south. Comparison of catches made by different collecting techniques indicates that pantraps catch the most specics and are the most cost effective