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plantigrade, but in walking the entire sole is not applied to the 

 ground as it is when the animal is standing. Toes, especially of 

 the fore foot, very free, and capable of being spread wide apart. 

 Claws compressed, curved, pointed, and non-retractile. Tail moder- 

 ately long, cylindrical, thickly covered with hair, annulated, non- 

 prehensile. Fur long, thick, and soft. The well-known Raccoon 1 

 (Procyon lotor, Fig. 260) of North America is the type of this genus. 

 It is a clumsy thickly-built animal about the size of a Badger, with 

 a coat of long coarse grayish-brown hairs, short ears, and a bushy 



Its range extends over the whole of 



Mack and white ringed tail. 





Pig. 2ii0. — The Raccoon (Procyon lotor). 



the United States, and stretches on the west northwards to Alaska 

 and southwards into Central America, where it attains its maximum 

 size. The following notes on the habits of the Raccoon are taken 

 from Dr. C. H. Merriam's Mammals of the Adirondack Region: — 



" Raccoons are omnivorous beasts, and feed upon mice, small 

 birds, birds' eggs, turtles and their eggs, frogs, fish, crayfish, 

 molluscs, insects, nuts, fruits, maize, and sometimes poultry. Ex- 

 cepting the bats and flying squirrels, they are the most strictly 

 nocturnal of all our mammals, and yet I have several times seen 

 them abroad on cloudy days. They haunt the banks of ponds 

 and streams, and find much of their food in these places, such as 



1 A corruption of the Xorth American Indian " arrathkune " or "arathcone." 

 The French raton or raton Iwoeur, German Wascfcbar, and other European names 

 are derived from a curious habit the Raccoon has of dipping or washing its food in 

 water before eating it. 



