Feb., 191 2. Mammals of Illinois and Wisconsin — Cory. 87 



Family BOVIDt^. Bison, Oxen, Sheep, etc. 



Horns curved and cylindrical, simple (not branched), hollow and 

 permanent (not annually shed), usually present in both sexes; lach- 

 rymal bone almost always articulating with the nasal; no canine 

 teeth or incisors in upper jaw; canines in lower jaw resembling incisors; 

 stomach divided into four compartments as in most other Ruminants ; 

 gall bladder present;* lateral digits represented by "false hoofs" or 

 absent. A widely distributed family, including the American Bison 

 or Buffalo, Oxen, Sheep, Goats, etc., as well as the true Antelopes, 

 but not the so-called American Antelope or Pronghorn which is usually 

 placed in a family by itself. f Three subfamilies are represented in 

 North America: Bison (Bovincs); Musk-oxen {Ovibovince) ; and Moun- 

 tain Sheep and Goats {Caprince). 



Genus BISON H. Smith. 



Bison H. Smith, Griffith's Cuvier Animal Kingdom, V, 1827, p. 373. 



Type Bos bison Linn. 



Horns curved and cylindrical, hollow and permanent; body covered 

 with woolly hair; head, part of neck and upper fore legs covered with 

 long, shaggy hair; a ''hump" on shoulders due to unusually long 

 vertebral spines at that point; horns and hoofs black. 



Dental formula: I. ^^, C. ^^^ Pm. ^^l M. ^^^- 32. 

 ?>-i i-i 3-3 ?>~d> ^ 



The living representatives of this genus are the American Bison 

 and its northern race, the Wood Bison, together with the European 

 Bison {B. bonasus), which still exists in parts of Lithuania, Roumania, 

 and the Caucasus. 



Bison bison (Linn.). 



American Bison. Buffalo. 



[Bos] bison Linn^us, Syst. Nat., X ed., 1758, p. 72. 



B[iso?i] bison Jordan, Man. Vert. Anim., 5th ed., 1888, p. 337. 



Bison bison Garman, Bull. Essex Inst., XXVI, 1894, p. 4 (Kentucky). Rhoads, 



Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., 1896 (1897), p.' 177 (Tennessee). Osborn, Annals 



of Iowa, VI, 1905, p. 563 (Iowa). 



* Except in Cephalopus. 



t Dr. M. W. Lyon considers the American Antelope to belong to the family 

 BovidcB. (Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., XXXIV, 1908, p. 398.) 



