86 BULLETIN NO. VII. 



SUB-FAMILY MELIK M. 



THE BADGERS. 



We have already given the diagnosis of the sub-family with 

 sufficient detail for our present purpose and may pass to an ac- 

 count of the only species of the American genus Taxidea. 



GENUS TAXIDEA, WATERHOUSE. 



Dentition -|. {-. . =34. Skull expanded behind, the inter- 

 mastoid diameter nearly equaling the inter-zygomatic. Audi- 

 tory bullae very much inflated, impinging behind upon the 

 paroccipitals. Palatals extending half way to the ends of the 

 pterygoids. Coronoid process of jaw erect, pointed. Anterior 

 molar below rather small, posterior lower molar bi-tuberculate. 

 Back upper molar forming a right-angled triangle, with the 

 hypothenuse directed backward and outward. Limbs short, 

 fossorial. Body depressed. Tail short, flat. Pelage long 

 flaccid covering the back like a thatch. 



Taxidea americana BAIRD. 



PLATE III. 

 BADGER. 



One specimen only of the badger has been seen during the 

 survey and from its comparative rarity no additional informa- 

 tion has been gathered. I am therefore forced to draw wholly 

 from Coues' N. A. Mustelidae, a work so generally accessible 

 as to render synonomy and exhaustive descriptive matter un- 

 necessary. The species is distributed throughout the United 

 States west of Wisconsin, extending farther east in British 

 America. In Mexico a sub-species T. berlandieri takes its place. 

 ' 'The badger varies greatly in color, as a fortuitous matter of 

 age, season, or condition of pelage, aside from certain geogra- 

 phical differences. The variation, however, is mainly in the 

 relative amounts of the blackish tawny-gray and white which 

 produce the general grizzle, the pattern of coloration being well 

 preserved, especially as to the markings of the head. The top 

 of the head is dark brown or blackish, generally increasing in 

 .ntensity and purity from the nape to the snout. This dark 

 area is divided lengthwise by a sharp white or whitish median 

 stripe, which runs from the snout, or just back of it, to the 

 nape, where it is generally lost in the grizzle of that part. The 



