632 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



who told mc that he had killed one with his pocket knife. 

 The animal jumped on him one day while he was skin- 

 ning a deer, and he slashed at it wildly with his knife. 

 He was fortunate enough to strike it in the eye, and be- 

 fore it could recover from that blow he thrust his blade 

 into the second eye, destroying both. He finished the 

 assailant at his leisure, and for this accidental feat became 

 a renowned hunter, warrior and sub-chief among his 

 people. 



"Cows with calves and mares with foals have been 

 seen to kill pumas; then, again, the latter have been 

 known to be victorious." 



In former geological ages there ranged over the ter- 

 ritory we now know as the United States some enor- 

 mous representatives of the cat tribes ; these have, ages 

 ago, become utterly extinct. The most formidable 

 among them were the famous sabre-toothed tigers. 



Some mam- 

 malogists In- 

 clude all the 

 American 

 Leopards in a 

 special group 

 of the genus 

 'Fr/ij called the 

 Leopardus 

 group, assign- 

 ing the Lynxes 

 to another 

 .the group 

 Lynx. The 

 first includes 

 the largest 

 cats in the 

 United States 

 fauna, and, 

 though desig- 

 nated as leop- 

 ards, they are 

 not all spotted 

 as the popular 

 mind takes all 



leopards to be. In fact, this only applies to the Jaguar 

 {F. It. hernandesii) and the Ocelot (F. />. pardalis), 

 while the Yaguarundi {F. yagouaroundi tolteca) and 

 the Eyra (F. eyra) are essentially plain colored animals. 

 As will be seen from the descriptions given elsewhere, 

 some of the lynxes are spotted, and some are quite plain 

 and devoid of any pronounced markings. Elliot re- 

 marks that some of the varieties of the Lynx "hold a 

 very questionable distinctive rank," in which statement 

 I entirely agree with him. 



As a comparatively near relative of the Cougar we 

 have, in this country, the Jaguar, a magnificent repre- 

 sentative of the Fclidac or Cat family confined to the 

 extreme southern part of the United States, and they 

 may occur in any suitable region from Louisiana to 

 Arizona. Personally, I have never met with the jaguar 

 in its native haunts, and there are but very few Amerl- 



THE MEXICAN JAGUAR 



This big leopard-like cat often has a length of nine feet from tip to tip. Occasionallv 

 it is found in Texas, southern Louisana and New Mexico, while it ranges southward 

 through Mexico, Central America and South America. 



can naturalists or hunters who have. The writer is the 

 first to have published an account of its occurrence in 

 Arizona. It was based upon the perfectly reliable state- 

 ment of the late Mr. Herbert Brown, of Yuma, Arizona, 

 who wrote in regard to it in April, 1902. In his letter 

 Mr. Brown said : 



"I send you the photograph of a very interesting ani- 

 mal which was killed in the Rincon mountains, about 

 twenty-five miles east of Tucson, on the i6th of March 

 last ; it was killed by two Mexican scalp hunters. They 

 were in the Rincons, above the Cebadilla, when their 

 dogs found the trail of what appeared to be a very large 

 California lion. After a short run the animal was over- 

 taken, and two dogs were killed in the mix-up that fol- 

 lowed. It was finally driven into a cave, smoked out 

 and killed. An examination of the photograph will show 

 where a bullet entered the skull a little to the left of the 



right eye; an- 

 other went 

 through the 

 shoulders, but 

 that cannot 

 well be seen. 

 1 1 measured 

 six feet seven 

 inches from 

 the point of the 

 nose to the 

 base of thetail, 

 and nearly ten 

 feet from tip 

 of nose to tip 

 of tail, nine- 

 teen inches 

 around the 

 forearm and 

 twenty-six and 

 a ih a 1 f in- 

 ches around 

 the head. In 

 the skull you 

 will notice that 

 the lower right canine tooth has been broken oflf, but oth- 

 erwise the teeth are in perfect condition. The skin and 

 skull are in possession of William C. Brown, of Tucson, 

 to whom I am indebted for measurements and photo- 

 graph. The animal was a male and very fat. 



"I do not think the habitat of this jaguar (Felis onca) 

 has ever been credited to Arizona ; but you will, I think, 

 agree with me that it is fairly well established. Within 

 the last few years several have been killed iir Southern 

 Arizona. One was killed in the Chiricahuas, one in 

 Baboquivaris, and one near Globe. Of the last there 

 were two together, but only one was secured. Another 

 is known to frequent a small range of rocky hills about 

 five miles north of the Tortolita mountains ; it was last 

 seen on the ninth of March, and a determined effort is 

 shortly to be made to get it. There are numerous other 

 instances in which it has been taken, but I do not now 



