SCIUROPTERUS VOLUCELLA. 1 9/ 



a few evenings of similar exercise, in which the battcnrs became quite 

 expert in the use of their weapon, every wielding of the wooden 

 bat bringing down an expiring namesake, the war terminated by 

 the extermination of every individual of the enemy in the main 

 building. However there still was the cock-loft of the laundry, 

 which gave evidence of a large population. In this case I had re- 

 course to a plan which had been recommended, but was not carried 

 out in regard to the dwelling-house. I employed a slater to re- 

 move a portion of the slating which required repairing. This pro- 

 cess discovered some fifteen hundred or two thousand bats, of 

 which the larger number were killed, and the surviving sought the 

 barn, trees, and other places of concealment in the neighborhood. 

 " In the main building nine thousand six hundred and forty bats, 

 from actual counting, were destroyed. ... At the end of five 

 years the odor has now nearly disappeared, being barely percepti- 

 ble during a continuance of very damp weather." * 



Order GLIRES. Family SCIURID.-E. 



SCIUROPTERUS VOLUCELLA (Pallas) Geoffrey. 



Flying Squirrel. 



Two varieties of Flying Squirrel occur in the Adirondacks : the 

 present form, confined mainly to the borders of the region, and a 

 northern race, commonest in the elevated portions of the interior. 



The subject of this sketch feeds upon a variety of nuts, seeds, 

 and buds, and upon beetles and perhaps other insects, not hesita- 

 ting to eat flesh when occasion offers. I have caught many in 

 box-traps baited with beef, and have frequently known them to 

 devour dead birds, the heads of which they particularly relish. 

 Whether they prey upon the smaller species that roost in the forest 

 I am unable to say, but their agility and their noiseless movements 



* An Account of a Remarkable Accumulation of Bats. Smithsonian Annual Report for 1863 

 1864, pp. 407-409. 



