Occasional Papers of the Aliiseiiiii of Zoology 13 



tracks every winter month. It is mainly nocturnal, but it also 

 travels in the early evening and later morning, and I once saw 

 a mother and six young pass through the dooryard just at 

 dusk. The skunk is not a climber, as a rule, but I have found 

 it a few feet up the inside of small hollow trees. Once I saw 

 one enter a small stream and swim across ; it was not forced, 

 but went into the water of its own volition. 



Taxidca ta.viis taxus. Badger. — The early settlers state that 

 the badger was found in this county, but was not common. 

 We have records from 1883 to 1919, including Saline Town- 

 ship, Superior Township, Lyndon Township, Ann Arbor, 

 Chelsea, and Bass Lake. The species hibernates, but I have 

 known it to come out on the snow, and I have records for every 

 winter month. 



Lntra canadensis canadensis. Canada Otter. — Formerly the 

 otter was not rare in all the river systems of the county, and 

 we know of a number being taken on the Huron, Raisin, and 

 Saline rivers from 1856 to 1910, but none have been reported 

 since that date. Three were seen and one shot by Edwin 

 Hawley near Munith, Jackson County, not far from the 

 county line, March 25, 1909. One was reported seen in a 

 small mud lake in Lodi Township in 1910. At this same lake 

 in 1886 two were taken by J. H. Bortle, of Saline. In May, 

 1908, John Staebler, a farmer, saw one at close range near 

 Fleming Creek, two miles east of Ann Arbor, and in the spring 

 of 1900 he saw another near the same place. 



Felis cougar. — L. D. Watkins, of Manchester, records this 

 animal as often passing through Manchester, about 1835, gen- 

 erally going southwest; the last one was seen in 1870. Hon. 

 Henry S. Dean, of Ann Arbor, stated that one was reported 

 in the county by hunters in 1838. Miss JuHa Dexter Stan- 



