350 Game of Evirope, W. Sc N. Asia & America 



THE HUEHUETAN WHITETAIL 



i^Mazania amcricana tho/nasi) 



The Odocoik'us thomasi of Dr. Merriam ' is another small form of 

 whitetail from the Chiapas district of Mexico, the type specimen heing 

 from Huehuetan. It is of rather large size, and rufous at all seasons of 

 the year, the tail being coloured as in the Virginian whitetail, but the 

 metatarsal gland and tuft very much reduced in size, and situated about 

 half-way up the hind cannon-bone. The summer coat differs from the 

 winter dress merely by the shorter hair and its uniform fulvous colour, 

 which lacks the grizzled golden appearance so noticeable in winter. 

 Antlers provisionally assigned to this form are of a simple type, sloping 

 regularly backward from the flice, and giving off only a sub-basal snag on 

 the inner side ; the tips curve inwards and slightly forwards. The skull 

 is described as being very like that of the Honduras whitetail, but of 

 somewhat larger size and width, with shorter nasal bones. 



THE HONDURAS WHITETAIL 



[Mazama amerkaiia truei) 



In Dctr of All hands this form — the Cariaciis chivatus of Mr. True — 

 was allowed specific rank, although its resemblance to the Virginian 

 whitetail was noticed. The above-mentioned modifications of the 

 whitetail type described by Dr. Merriam seem to render it no longer 

 possible to exclude the present form from this group, in spite of certain 

 differences in the skull from that of the typical M. awcriccuia, and it is 

 accordingly regarded as another local modification of that variable and 

 widely ranging species. 



1 Of. cit. p. 102 (1898). 



