VIII 



THE VIRGINIA DEER 



BY far the most common and widely distributed of 

 our deer is the Virginia deer, often called the 

 red deer. This deer is our most important big-game 

 animal, best suited, as we have observed, to the game- 

 preserve ; it occupies in the big-game field the same 

 important position that the Virginia partridge occu- 

 pies among the game-birds. 



There is no more reason for calling this animal, 

 which is found from Canada to Mexico, and from the 

 Atlantic to the Pacific, the Virginia deer than there is 

 for naming our best known and most widely distrib- 

 uted partridge, " Bob-white," the Virginia partridge. 

 There may be some appropriateness in these names as 

 a tribute to the inhabitants of that commonwealth, who 

 have from Washington's time been ardent sportsmen, 

 differing much in that regard from the colonists of 

 New England, but a local name is misleading when 

 applied to a bird or beast of wide geographical distri- 

 bution. 



The Virginia deer is more abundant in some of the 

 other States than in Virginia. 



The name red deer refers to the summer coat, which 

 is reddish gray. In the autumn when the deer as- 

 sumes its winter coat the coat is often referred to as 



"7 



