204 



U. S. P. R. R. EXP. AlfD SURVEYS ZOOLOGY GENERAL REPORT. 



The following is the result of a direct comparison of the European with the American badger 

 since the body of this article was written : 



The differences between the European and American badgers are so strongly marked as 

 scarcely to require a comparison. Thus, in the former, the top and sides of the h'ead may be 

 described as white, the end of the muzzle completely encircled by this color ; a little more than 

 half way between the end of the snout and the eye commences a strip of black, truncate ante 

 riorly, and sending down a small branch towards the canine ; this strip widens gradually, in 

 cluding the eye and ear, and is lost on the shoulders. The black of the legs extends over the 

 throat to near the end of the chin. There are thus on the top and sides of the head five stripes, 

 a median, and two lateral white ones, and two intermediate of black, in addition to the black 

 beneath the head ; and anterior to the ear all the stripes are of the same width. 



In the American badger the top of the head is grizzled, with a narrow white median stripe ; 

 the end of the muzzle (top and sides) is black. The cheeks are white, with a crescentic black 

 patch anterior to the ear. The whole under part of head and throat are white. 



There are other important differences of structure. Thus the naked muffle is much larger 

 than in the American, and the hairs on the top of the nose do not come within a quarter of an 

 inch of the extremity, instead of reaching to the very end. 



The American badger is widely distributed throughout the United States, extending from 

 Wisconsin, Illinois, and Iowa, to the Pacific ocean. It ranges far to the north, though no 

 positive indication is on hand of its occurrence south of about latitude 35, below which it 

 appears to be replaced by the other species. 1 



Although most authors have made the Mexican badger the same with that of the Missouri 

 plains, yet the distinctions are quite decided, as will be seen in the article on Taxidea ber- 

 landieri. 



List of specimens. 



1 This species has usually borne the name of labradoria, as imposed by Gmelin, in 1788. Boddaert, however, in 1784, named 

 it Melts taxus, var. americanus, and in 1787, Zimmermann, in his German translation of Pennant's Arctic Zoology, called it 

 Melts americanus. This name, therefore, takes priority of date over labradoria. 



