The North American Cervidce. 149 



The rutting season is in September and October, the "velvet" 

 having been shed from the antlers during the early part of the for- 

 mer month. At the beginning of the rut the bucks are enormously 

 fat, and the flesh at this time is superior to that of any deer with 

 which I am acquainted. 



Caton's variety of the mule-deer ( C. macrotis Californicus ) (Am. 

 Nat., X., 464, August, 1876) is distinguished from the ordinary form 

 by a more reddish cast of pelage, and by the presence of a dark line 

 extending down the upper surface of the tail and uniting with the 

 black brush at the tip. 



Black-Tail Deer (Cariacus Columbianus (Rich) Gray). 



The true black-tail deer is intermediate in size between the mule 

 and the common deer. In form and build it more nearly resembles the 

 former, while weighing about as much as the latter. The horns curve 

 forward more decidedly than in Cariacus macrotis, but in the forking 

 of the beam it resembles that species. The tail, on the other hand, 

 is more like that of C Virginianus, being broad and flat, though not 

 so long as in that species, and covered throughout with hair. It is 

 white below and black above and on the sides. 



In color, the black-tail resembles our common red deer, being 

 bright bay in summer and changing to gray in the winter. The 

 under surface of the head and the belly are white. The changes in 

 the pelage, as regards time and character, are similar to those which 

 take place in the mule-deer. 



The range of this species is the most circumscribed of any of our 

 Cervidce. It appears to be confined to a comparatively narrow strip 

 of territory — the mountain ranges of the Pacific coast. There is no 

 record of its capture east of the Sierra Nevada mountains, although 

 a hunter of reliability has informed me that, in an experience of ten 

 years in the Central Rocky Mountain region, he believes that he has 

 killed three deer of this species. Something more definite than a 

 doubtful statement of this kind is required, however, before we can 

 extend the limits of this species beyond those given above. In the 

 Sierra Nevadas, and in the mountains of the Coast Range, the black- 

 tail is abundant, sharing its range to the south with Caton's mule- 



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