NORTH AMERICA AND THE WEST INDIES 245 



do the larger neighboring races. The type specimen was said 

 to have measured in the flesh 7 feet 4 inches from tip of nose to 

 tip of tail, of which the latter was 28.5 inches. It weighed 170 

 pounds (perhaps an estimate). Greatest length of skull, 198 

 mm. 



This small race of the puma was probably confined to the 

 desert regions of the lower Colorado River in southeastern 

 California and the adjacent parts of Arizona, where, according 

 to the authors above quoted, it "is now rare, perhaps even near 

 to extinction." They add that in the "spring of 1910, while 

 exploring the Colorado River from Needles to Yuma," they 

 obtained evidence, both direct and through report, of the pres- 

 ence of mountain lions about Riverside Mountain in the ex- 

 treme northeastern part of Riverside County, California. The 

 animals here "appeared to range chiefly through the densely 

 wooded bottom lands, though one was reliably reported to 

 have been seen among the rough desert hills which constitute 

 'Riverside Mountain'." They saw a fresh track on May 1, 

 1910, four miles below Potholes, on the California side of the 

 River, and had further reports from Ehrenberg, Cibola, and 

 Potholes; and secured two hides and skulls from a rancher 18 

 miles north of Picacho who had shot the animals the previ- 

 ous autumn. These pumas had appeared in the region where 

 none had been seen for ten years, and one by one killed off 

 eight of the rancher's hogs. Finally one was hunted down and 

 shot. "Meanwhile the hogs had become thoroughly frightened 

 and had taken to swimming the river twice daily to forage for 

 mesquite beans on the Arizona side, where they appeared to 

 feel safer. " A second lion continued the depredations and was 

 eventually shot. Inquiry of the rancher 12 years later brought 

 out the fact that he had seen no more pumas since that event. 

 In 1909, a pair of mountain lions appeared near Calexico and 

 were occasionally seen by the ditch tender swimming the main 

 Imperial Canal at that point. These lions lived on pigs that 

 had gone wild. Since 1910 no information is available from 

 California as to the status of this race, and it is doubtful if it 

 still exists. 



Outside of the immediate delta region of the Colorado, it is 

 likely that this subspecies was found in northern Lower Cali- 

 fornia. Nelson (1921) includes it without comment in his lists 

 of the fauna of the region. Probably it was closely similar to 



