Canada Porcupine 
he has been eaten; even the wily fisher is said to be occasion- ~ 
ally killed in this manner. 
The porcupine’s home is usually a hollow log or cavern 
among the rocks. 
Here he can sleep in comparative safety curled up with his 
back to the entrance, presenting a most formidable chevaux 
de frise against attack. 
In cold rough weather he stays indoors day and_ night, 
probably endeavouring to sleep and forget his hunger. As soon 
as it grows a little milder he crawls out and makes haste to 
stuff himself with bark and green twigs to nourish him during 
the next cold spell. 
When the snow melts at the approach of spring and the 
new sap starts up under the bark to swell the buds in the 
March sunshine he fares somewhat better, and long before the 
last drift has vanished is able to gather a taste of young green 
leaves along sunny banks beneath the evergreens, together with 
the hardier sorts that winter under the snow, now laid bare 
again to the sunlight. 
Porcupines are not prolific animals; a pair of twins to each 
family early in the summer appears to be the general rule, the 
youngsters being about as rough and ugly looking as their parents. 
POCKET GOPHERS 
(Family Geomyide ) 
These curious little animals are characterized by their large 
cheek pouches opening outside the mouth, and their modified 
fore feet with immense claws suited for digging. Their bodies 
are heavy and their movements somewhat clumsy. The skull 
is thick, and in the species of Geomys which is the only genus 
represented in the East, the upper incisors are grooved. In the 
allied genus Thomomys, which is abundantly represented in the 
West, this is not the case. 
The gophers are nocturnal and live in communities, burrow- 
ing in the ground like the marmots. They are very abundant 
in our Western States and two species extend eastward into the 
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