24 NEW YORK ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



arcticus, of the Barren Grounds ; R. pearyi, of Ellesmereland, and 

 R. groenlandicus, of Greenland. 



The second group, of woodland caribou, holds four species, all 

 of which lie to the south of the barren ground species. In con- 

 trast to their northern cousins they are forest animals. In the 

 Cassiar Mountains of British Columbia we have R. osborni, 

 handsomest and largest of all caribou; R. montanus, of British 

 Columbia, passing over the border into the United States; R. 

 caribou, of Canada, east into Nova Scotia, and R. terraenovae, 

 in Newfoundland. 



These nine species are all fairly well separated, and are all, 

 but especially the barren ground group, closely related to the 

 Eurasian reindeer, of which as yet only three species have 

 been described. Their varietal development on this continent 

 indicates a long residence here, longer probably than that of the 

 moose. 



The next genus of the deer, Cervus, has one outlying member 

 in America, the wapiti. This genus first appears fossil in the 

 Middle Pleistocene, and has only developed two local races of 

 doubtful value, C. occidentalis, or the Olympic elk, and C. mer- 

 riami f a small form from Arizona and the San Joaquin Valley in 

 California. The wapiti once ranged to the Atlantic Ocean and 

 as far northeast as the Adirondacks, and in the East may possibly 

 have had local characters of subspecific value. 



THE AMERICAN DEER. 



Last of all the deer we come to a strongly marked genus, Odo- 

 coileus, which includes all North American deer not referred to 

 above. There are in the United States and Canada at least four 

 well-marked species, with seven or eight subspecies. In South 

 and Central America there are at least twenty additional species, 

 all belonging to Odocoileus, together with a closely related genus 

 containing one small and aberrant form, Pudua. 



All deer being of northern origin, these South American deer 

 show signs of the deterioration which inevitably overtakes the 

 members of the deer family when they enter the tropics. 



Only three of the North American species need be referred to : 

 first, the Virginia deer, O. virginianus, extending with its sub- 

 species westward into the Rockies, and south into Florida and 

 Texas, where it meets the closely related Coues' deer, 0. couesi; 

 second, the mule deer, 0. hemionus, of the western plains and 



