210 CALIFORNIA MAMMALS. 



Lynx eremicus Mkarns. (Hermit.) 



DESERT LYNX. 



Summer pelage (May to Sept.) ; above grayish tawny olive 

 more or less mottled or spotted with brown or blackish, usually 

 with a pair of narrow interrupted black stripes along the back; 

 crown with indistinct narrow blackish stripes; an indefinite 

 whitish eyering surrounding black eyelids; whiskers mosiry white, 

 with several rows of small black spots or lines at their basis ; con- 

 vex surface O'f ears black enclosing a triangular pale gray spot, 

 which often covers half the ear; upper side of the tail similar 

 to the back, with black tip and one to six black bars, the interven- 

 ing spaces becoming whitish toward the tip; under side of tail 

 white; outside of the legs more tawny than the back, indistinctly 

 spotted with brown or blackish ; inner side of le'gs grayish or 

 brownish white distinctly barred and spotted with black ; throat 

 white sometimes spotted with blackish ; a wide buffy or tawny 

 band across the breast, usually spotted with blackish ; belly white 

 spotted with black. Winter pelage. (Sept. to May) ; tawny shades 

 of upper parts replaced with drab gray. Young; at first tawny 

 thickly spotted with brockish, the spots small ; later the color be- 

 comes grayer and the spots larger and fewer. 



Length about 825 mm. (32.50 inches) ; tail vertebrae 160 

 (6.30) ; hind foot 170(6.70) ; ear from crown 80 (3. 15) ; the tuft 

 of hairs nearly an inch longer. Weight 12 to 20 pounds. The 

 female averages smaller than the male. 



Type locality, Colorado Desert, California. 

 Desert Lynxes are common in most of the wooded and brushy 

 parts of central and southern California from the seacoast to the 

 Colorado River, and in northern Lower California. They vary 

 greatly in amount of spotting, shade of color, size of ear tuft and 

 barring of tail, dependent on age, season and wear of pelage. Be- 

 fore me lie seventeen Lynx skins taken in one locality (35 miles 

 northeast of San Diego), all prepared and measured by myself, 

 therefore strictly comparable. These vary in color from a tawny 

 olive above with scarcely an indication of spots, to drab gray 



