1196 Life-histories of Northern Animals 

 GESTA- The gestation is, as usual, prolonged, being 9^ or 10 



TION ^1 



months. 

 YOUNG As in the case of the Red-bat, 4 appear to be the normal 



number of young at birth, though experience would lead us to 

 look for a lower average in the nursery. In the collection of 

 the Manitoba Natural History Society is a female with 2 young 

 at her breast. 



J. S. Charleson, of MacDonald, Man., tells me that at 

 Sourismouth he found a female hanging in a tree with 4 young 

 clinging to her breast; they were so tightly fast to her teats 

 that they could not be removed. 



They are born, apparently, in the last week of May. 

 Merriam records^ that: "On the evening of the 30th of June 

 last (1883) Dr. A. K. Fisher shot a large female, measuring 

 422 mm. (i6| inches), at my home in Lewis County. It had 

 already given birth to its young, and each of its 4 mammae 

 bore evidence of having recently been nursed." 



These might have been born in June, but the analogy of 

 the closely related Red-bat weighs in favour of a date at least 

 a week earlier than June i. This would fit in nicely with 

 another record by Merriam: 



"The only young I have ever seen [he says]' was shot here 

 August 6, 1883, by Walter H. Merriam. It was nearly full 

 grown, measuring 400 mm. (15I inches) in extent, and differed 

 from the adults chiefly in being a little lighter coloured." 



MiGRA Like all northern species of the Family, this Bat is migra- 



tory. Not a surprising fact when one remembers that it hates 

 the cold as much as swallows do, and is at least as well equipped 

 to seek more genial climes when frosty nights come on to nip 

 its tender wings, rob the forests of its food, and turn its 

 favourite forage ground to bleak and barren wastes. 



Observations on its movements are hard to make, and so 

 are few to-day. An important record by G. S. Miller runs 

 thus:' 



'•Ibid., p. 179, 'Ibid., p. 179. 



' N. A. Fauna, No. 13, 1897, p. 11. 



