396 MAMMALIA 



poison baits, trapping and hunting are all resorted to, in an attempt 

 to decimate them. 



The hare family {Lepus) includes the Jack hare (sometimes called 

 the Jack rabbit), the prairie hare, the vaj-ying hare and the polar hare. 

 The " Jack hare " can distance a speedy greyhound and some hunters 

 insist that it can beat a rifle bullet! The hare is a large, long-legged, 

 long-eared animal which does not burrow, but rears its young in a 

 nest. 



Hares and rabbits girdle trees and eat garden vegetables, clover 

 and alfalfa. It is said that except when famished hares exhibit 

 considerable delicacy of taste, selecting only certain varieties of 

 soy-beans and alfalfa. Rabbits, introduced into Australia and New 

 Zealand, spread rapidly and destroyed the grass so that sheep died 

 of starvation. 



Tularemia, a disease somewhat similar to spotted fever,^ is car- 

 ried by lice and ticks from one rabbit to another. It may cause 

 serious epidemics and reduce the number of rabbits and ground 

 squirrels considerably. Man is susceptible to tularemia. It is 

 transmitted from the bites of ticks or lice, or from handling diseased 

 rodents. 



Fossil Relatives of the Rodentia. — Rabbits and squirrels were 

 first found in the Oligocene of North America, while the beaver, rats, 

 and mice appeared in the Pliocene of Europe. 



Order VII. Edentata. — Clawed, without enamel on the teeth; 

 teeth absent from the anterior part of the jaw. Great number of 

 sacral vertebrae, as many as thirteen in some armadillos. Brain 

 sometimes low, sometimes of comparatively high organization. 



There are three genera of South American ant-eaters {Myrineco- 

 phagidae), all lacking teeth, but with extremely long protrusible 

 tongue, plentifully coated with a thick secretion developed from their 

 salivary glands. They have long snouts and powerful bodies 

 adapted to tearing bark from trees or ripping open ant hills. (Figure 

 225.) 



The great ant-eater may reach a body length of five feet with a 

 tail as much as two feet long. It is able to defend itself against dogs 

 and snakes. The single oflfspring rides on the back of the mother, 

 remaining with her a year. The tamandua, a small ant-eater found 



^ R. R. Parker and J. S. Dade, Tularaemia in Sheep in Nature, Pub. H. Reports, 

 vol. 44, Jan. 18, 19-9, found Bacterium tularense in the flesh of sheep. Probably the 

 wood tick, Dermacentor andersoni, transmits the disease from jack rabbits to sheep. 



