AMERICAN PORCUPINES 
Family Erethizontide 
Wherever found porcupines may always be known by their 
spines. The short legs, plantigrade feet and short thick tail are also 
characteristic of our North American species, but foreign porcupines 
exhibit many differences in their structure, one kind found in South 
America having a long prehensile tail like our opossum. The quills 
or spines of the porcupine are scattered about amongst the hair and 
all point backward but may be elevated at will by the muscular con- 
traction of the skin and being so loosely attached at the base are 
frequently impaled in the face or feet of any animal which may come 
in contact with them. 
In the Canada porcupine the quills are usually shorter than the 
hair but in certain foreign species they are greatly developed. 
Besides the Canada porcupine we have one other closely allied 
species in North America, the yellow-haired porcupine (Erethizon 
epixanthus) of British Columbia and western United States. 
Canada Porcupine 
Erethizon dorsatus (Linnzus) 
Length. 28 inches. 
Description. Dark-brown to nearly black, quills tipped with yellow- 
ish, two to four inches long mostly concealed by the hair, which 
reaches a length of six inches; toes, four on the front feet and five 
on the hind. 
Range. Northern parts of North America south to Maine and in 
the higher mountains of Pennsylvania. Not found south of the 
Canadian faunal zone. 
The porcupine is much more interesting as a species than as an 
individual. Looked at either as an example of the beneficent protection 
which is rendered to every creature according to its needs, or as a 
branch of the rodent family that has succeeded in perfecting a most 
unique method of defence through the law of the survival of the 
fittest, it furnishes an interesting study. 
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