NO. 1405. MAMMALS OF NORTHWEST TERRTTORIES—MACFARLANE. 737 



MUSKRAT OR MUSQUASH. 



Fiber zibethicug hiulsoni'u>i Preble. 



Like most of thc^ important fur-bcarino- animals, tlie musquash 

 greatly tiuetuates in numlxM'. We have usually several seasons in 

 suceession when the}' ai'e very abundant, followed by qvute as many 

 when they are comparatively searce, and then between these periodic 

 fluctuations we have a year or two when the returns are either above 

 or below the average trade, as will now be demonstrated. From 1853 

 to 1877, the company sold in London 10,600,056 musquash, or an aver- 

 age of about 424,000 skins a year. Outfits 185H and 1854 exceeded 

 this result. Tiiey yielded, respective!}', 41»o,!>52 and 512,291; but the 

 following nine sales (1855 to 18(53) were all below the average, and 

 ranged between the period mininumi (177,291 skins) in 1860 and 357,060 

 in 1863. There was a material increase in 1864 (509,769 skins), then 

 three years of decline (418,370, 320,824, and 412,164 skins). How- 

 ever, 1868 gave as many as 618,081 skins, after which the two succeed- 

 ing seasons fell below the average (404,173 and 232,251 skins), and 

 the statement of sales winds up with seven good 3'ears, varying between 

 437.121 skins in 1877 and 768,896 skins in 1873, which was the best of 

 the series. 



The musquash abounds in all suital)le localities throughout the entire 

 Northwest Territories of C'anada. It is abundant in marshy tracts 

 on both sides of the mountains. It is also very connnon on the lower 

 Mackenzie River, and less so on the same portion of the Anderson 

 River, to their outlets in the polar sea. All)ino examples are occa- 

 sionally met with, but in all sections of the country formerh' ruled bv 

 the Hudson's Bay Company a few skins of a fine dark variety of this 

 species are annually secured by the native and other hunters. Seasons 

 of high water, however, are a necessary factor in the propagation of 

 the muskrat, while summers of drought and continued low water curtail 

 expansion and also cause many deaths during the succeeding winters. 

 In corroboration of this view I would ofi'er a few remarks. The 

 outfit 1889 was m}' first of five years' charge of the Cumberland Dis- 

 trict, lower Saskatchewan. Th(» stage of water that autumn was fairly 

 good in the many marshy streams, small lakes, and ponds in this mus- 

 quash country (prol)ably the best in western Canada), and the returns 

 therefore quadrupled those of the preceding season. The following 

 year was dry, and both water and the musquash catch shrunk consid- 

 eral)ly, while many thousands of the animals perished miserably under 

 the ice and in their frozen up "washes," or winter houses. Tiiis 

 unfortunate occurrence adversely afiected results for two or three 

 3'ears, but in the meantime water conditions improved and have been 

 very favorable for the last decade, so much so, indeed, that the armual 



