TRACKS IN THE SAND 51 



fur and part of the entrails of that animal. A 

 fox caught in a muskrat runway had his stomac h 

 full of muskrat fur. On one occasion I was fol- 

 lowing the tracks of a white-footed mouse. 

 These were joined by those of a fox. There 

 were some irregular jumps on the part of the 

 fox and the mouse tracks vanished. Again I 

 found the body of a herring gull on the beach 

 with head torn off and much of the flesh gone. 

 It was surrounded by tracks of both fox and crow, 

 but I venture to affirm that these two were not 

 companions at the feast. 



A dead creature on the beach always attracts 

 the scavengers. A big loon thrown up at the top 

 of the tide was surrounded by tracks in which 

 those of crow, fox and skunk could easily be rec- 

 ognized. The skunk had ambled up in the night 

 from low water and was making for the dunes 

 twenty feet to leeward of the loon; suddenly he 

 stopped, "skidding" a little, turned at right angles 

 and trotted directly to the loon. The loon was re- 

 centy dead, a wounded bird, no doubt, that had 

 escaped the clutches of the gunner. It showed 

 no mark of tooth or claw, but had been inspected 



