ORDER CARNIVORA: CARNIVORES 215 



Pocock (1935b, pp. 659-660) refers to "the discovery of this big 

 wolf in Yeso in the early 'eighties/' and to the opinion of Brauns 

 (1881) "that it possibly inhabited the Japanese islands . . . between 

 Yeso and Kamschatka." 



"Canis lupus L. is found ... in Sakhalin; in Hokkaido it was 

 abundant some thirty years ago, but it has decreased so that it seems 

 to be totally exterminated at present" (Hatta, 1928, p. 1037) . 



"Aoki and Kishida both reported it from this island [Sakhalin] 

 and Hokkaido (rare) " (Kuroda, 1928, p. 226) . 



"In authentic historic times the wolves occurred in the main 

 island of Hokkaido, in Sakhalin, and in Kunashiri, Etoruf and 

 Paramushir of the Kurile Islands. It seems true that the wolves 

 were not so frequent in Hokkaido as compared with the other 

 mammals. They were still fewer in Sakhalin and in the Kurile 

 group. Though old records say that the wolves fed mostly upon the 

 deer which abounded in Hokkaido, at the beginning of settlement 

 they wrought serious havoc amongst herds. So the government at 

 that time paid a high bounty for the slaughter of the animal. For 

 instance, the local government in Sapporo paid 7 yen for one wolf 

 from 1878 to 1882 and 10 yen for each from 1883 to 1885. More 

 than 1500 wolves were brought in for the bounty during the 11 years 

 from 1878 until 1888. Since then we have heard scarcely any account 

 of the animal in Hokkaido." (Inukai, 19326, p. 525.) 



Kuroda (1938, p. 36) gives the range of this subspecies as Sak- 

 halin, the Kuriles, and Hokkaido ; on this last island it is extinct. 



Japanese Raccoon-dog 



NYCTEREUTES PROCYONOIDES VIVERRINUS (Temminck) 



Canis viverrinus Temminck, Tijdschr. Natuurl. Geschied. Physiol., pt. 5, 



p. 285, 1839. (Japan.) 

 FIGS.: Temminck, 1842-45, pi. 8; Martens, 1876, pi. 1. 



Formerly abundant in Japan, this animal has become extremely 

 scarce. 



The form is small and foxlike; the tail is short and bushy. The 

 general color is yellowish brown; hairs of the back, shoulder, and 

 tail tipped with black; arms and legs blackish brown; a large dark 

 brown spot on each side of the face, beneath and behind the eye 

 (Martens, 1876, p. 78). The measurements of some representative 

 of the species on the Asiatic mainland are given by Mivart (1890, 

 p. 135) as follows: head and body, 530 mm.; tail, 140 mm. 



A century ago the Raccoon-dog was considered very common in 

 Japan (Temminck, 1844, p. 40) . At this period "Siebold found it to 

 be very common throughout the Japanese islands, where its flesh 

 was considered as good food with an agreeable flavour, and its 



