CONSERVING WILDLIFE — JACKSON 257 



Unique among all mammals, the odd-looking musk ox, which re- 

 sembles somewhat a miniature shaggy-haired buffalo and combines 

 certain features of the cattle tribe on the one hand with those of the 

 sheep on the other, is dwindling in numbers. Although formerly 

 occurring in the barren grounds from northern Alaska to eastern 

 Greenland, it is at present found native only on the east coast of Green- 

 land and in Arctic barrens directly north and northwest of Hudson 

 Bay as far as about latitude 83°. Even within these ranges musk 

 oxen inhabit only certain areas, and there are immense expanses where 

 none occurs. Attempts are being made by the Canadian Government 

 to colonize the species in the Dominion. Of an initial stock of 34 musk 

 oxen brought by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service from 

 Greenland, via Norway and the United States, to Alaska in 1930, and 

 held at the United States Biological Survey Experiment Station, Fair- 

 banks, for study and acclimatization, 4 animals were introduced on 

 Nunivak Island National Wildlife Refuge in Bering Sea in 1935 and 

 27 in 1936. This herd had increased to more than 100 animals in 1941. 



Stories and legends about mermaids originated in superstitions about 

 those peculiar aquatic mammals, the dugongs and the manatees. In 

 their present distribution, dugongs inhabit only parts of the Eastern 

 Hemisphere, whereas the three species of manatees occur only in the 

 Atlantic coastal waters of America from Florida to Brazil. The 

 manatees are harmless mammals that feed on aquatic vegetation. All 

 may be included in the endangered list, but the status of the most 

 northerly form, the Florida manatee, is especially critical. Ample 

 legal protection, it would seem, is afforded the animal, but laws are not 

 always enforced, and many individuals are wantonly shot. Sudden 

 drops in temperature to freezing, or two or three nights of freezing 

 weather, often kill manatees. 



Even some of our smaller game mammals need especial protection 

 if we expect to continue them as a part of our American life. The 

 northeastern fox squirrel and the mangrove fox squirrel are both at 

 such a low population as to be near the vanishing point. 



With their high value for oil and other commercial products, all the 

 large whales face probable serious reduction in numbers. Three 

 species are now at the danger point. The gray whale, found offshore 

 in the North Pacific and at one time important in the whaling industry, 

 is so reduced in numbers that only a few are procured annually. The 

 bowhead whale, some 50 feet long and with massive, heavy head, for- 

 merly occurred throughout the oceans near the North Pole. It be- 

 came extirpated in the North Atlantic some 50 years ago and is now 

 limited to a sparse population in Bering Sea and toward the northeast 

 thereof. The North Atlantic right whale, another massive whale 

 that produced a heavy yield of oil and whalebone, was so eagerly 



