MUD TURTLE ATTACKED BY CRAB. 



Canoeing in the muddy shallows of a creek at 

 Mastic, Long Island, with Mr. Alan S. Nicolay on 

 August 29, 1914, a large Blue Crab was observed 

 firmly holding a Mud Turtle (Kinosternon pennsyl- 

 vanicum) of perhaps more than half its size, one of 

 whose feet waved helplessly above the surface. The 

 crab probably had it by the neck, and the encounter 

 might well have ended disastrously if not interrupted. 



The waters at Mastic are rather unusual. The 

 creek where the encounter took place, though directly 

 tributary to brackish Moriches Bay, is, judging from 

 the water plants, almost, if not quite, fresh. The 

 writer has taken the Painted Turtle in it. The Snap- 

 ping Turtle is common in the Mastic Region ; Spotted 

 Turtles are abundant in narrow, more or less fresh 

 creeks in the brackish meadow; the Mud Turtle is 

 frequently seen and the writer has found it on the 

 beach side of the bay. A fisherman at Brookhaven, 

 whose numerous stock of Diamond-backed Terrapin 

 were examined says that this part of the bay is excel- 

 lent for that species. The Box Turtle is common 

 in the woods, but the writer has never found the 

 Wood or Musk Turtles in the vicinity. 



Mr. Waldron De W. Miller considers the latter 

 species definitely less coast-wise than the Mud Turtle 

 in the vicinity of New York. He finds it at Plain- 

 field, N. J., where he has not taken the Mud Turtle, 

 which he has, however, found in the Cheesequake 

 Marshes, lower Raritan River Marshes, and at Sandy 

 Hook, N. J. j T NlCH0LS ^ 



New York, N. Y. 



AMBYSTOMA TIGRINUM IN SOUTH 

 DAKOTA. 



Last summer, during the month of August, the 

 writer lived among a number of Wahpeton Sioux, re- 

 siding about Drywood Lake about ten or twelve miles 

 from Sisseton, S. Dakota. The abundance of the 

 tiger salamander Amby stoma tigrinum in Drywood 

 Lake, and indeed in all the ponds thereabouts, was 



