•2tj2 SMALL ANIMALS AND INSECTS. [Cuap. IL 



The striped goplier abounds in the Northwestern prairie region. In the first 

 settlement of tlie country a luindred miles around Chicago, it inhabited all 

 the prairie groves and dry ravines. The following is its description : The 

 ears are short and rounded ; the tail slender and hairv, about half the length 

 >f the body ; the body is of a dark brown above, longitudinally marked with 

 alternate rows and spots of a light fawn-color, which correspond nearly with 

 the belly and sides. The lighter lines on the upper part may be distinguished 

 by the brown intervals between, which are occupied by the single rows of 

 light spots, which are generally indistinct on the anterior half of the l)ody. 



Although these animals are considered grain-eaters, and called mischiev- 

 ous, we believe they are among the many real friends of the farmer. Like 

 the weasel, which occasionally cats a chicken for lack of more favorite food, 

 the gopher sometimes eats the farmer's seed-corn, but he should not be con- 

 demned as an enemy for that act, without a fair hearing. 



There may be some of the gopher family that are destructive of farm 

 crops. The evidence is very strong to that effect against the Californian 

 gopher, which lives in holes all through the cultivated fields, and does not 

 seem to be very particular what it cats, whether corn, wheat, potatoes, beets, 

 melons, pumpkins, so that it is something which the farmer has grown for 

 his own nse. 



It is not so with the small striped gopher. This beautiful little animal 

 should be carefully preserved upon all farms where it now exists, and we 

 have no doubt it would prove a valuable addition to the stock of any farni 

 where it is not found in a natural condition. It is a great destroj^er of field- 

 mice, and in our opinion a whole troop of gophers do less damage in one 

 season than the mice which one of them would kill in a single day. For 

 they are real epicures, eating nothing but the blood and brains, when the 

 supply is abundant. These animals have such an appetite for flesh, that 

 if deprived of it, a mother will cat her young. Such carnivorous animals 

 must be better hunters than cats, and should be carefully preserved, and not 

 " drowned out," as they often are, when their homes are discovered by the 

 boys, just for the " sport" (cruelty) of killing them. These animals seem to 

 have a natural instinct that man is their common enemy. We have seen them 

 often in situations where they could never have had any acquaintance with 

 man, at least civilised ones, Avho are the only ones who ever kill such small 

 game for " sport," and we found tiiem wild in the extreme. They utter a 

 cry when discovered, and dart away into some shelter with great rapidit}'. 

 In this respect, quite unlike the chipmuck, which will play around a dog or 

 man in the most tantalizing manner. 



The striped gopher never gnaws trees, roots, fruits, nor green vegetables, 

 and in fact does the farmer no damage except to eat a little seed-coni. For 

 all that they eat in the harvest-field, they save twice as much in driving 

 away mice and squirrels. Chipmucks, red squirrels, and mice can not 

 inhabit the same locality with gophers ; and yet there are persons who have 

 offered bounties to have them destroyed. Let such learn this fact from this 



