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The v'anadian Field-Naturalist. 



[Vol. XXXV. 



and Avere partieiilarly i-onspiouous against 

 the white of the landscape. 



After the snow I followed weasel trails 

 frequently and found that they freely 

 weyt in and out of all gopher dens that 

 lav conveniently to their course. As a 

 diet the gopher is evidently highly re- 

 garded by this animal, but I found it im- 

 possible to ascertain when they explored 

 with success. It was incredible that there 

 could have been a gopher in eacli of the 

 burrows visited, for in the course of a 

 night's run they seemed almost innumer- 

 able I never had the patience to follow 

 to the end in all its intricacies the night's 

 trail of an ermine, although my wander- 

 ings in this regard have been really exten- 

 sive as a whole, and not without a like 

 measure of enlightenment and pleasure. 

 An old plainsman told me that once from 

 his horse, he watched a prairie weasel enter 

 a Richardson's ground squirrel colony 

 when the majority of the members v,^ere 

 under ground. He bounded easily but 

 furtively about from mound to hollow and 

 through herbage, lithe as a reptile, and 

 nosing the ground occcasionally like a 

 hound. Presently there caught his eye an 

 isolated and unlucky gopher liberally 

 separated from his burrow. The latter 

 was feeding with his back towards the 

 weasel, but at this moment, apprehending 

 dant^er bv some subtlety, he clumsily wheel- 

 ed and made a few frightened jumps to- 

 wards his home. The weasel met him 

 with the thirst of conquest, sever- 

 ing all * hope of escape. In a flash 

 the gopher, realiziiig this, sank back 

 threateningly, chattering and screeching 

 hoar.sely with terror; the next breath and 

 the two were mixed in coml)at. But, stran- 

 ge to relate, attracted by the confusion of 

 wails and weird vocal pirouettings from 

 the expiring gopher, relatives and neigh- 

 bors shot out ever^-where from their bur- 

 rows, and poured in one averting or aveng- 

 ing mob about the ears of the agg'.essor. 

 Left alone with one gopher the weasel is nn- 

 doubtedly happy, but this chipi)ering, 

 clianiping, insane rabble was too much. He 

 breasted the tide gallantly for a wliile, lo.st 

 heart, and remembered a pressing engage- 

 ment' in another quarter; or were the 

 grapes sour anyway.^ A few gophers fol- 

 h.wed him for a short distance by way of 

 im[)ressing further thf ignominy of defea' , 

 then returned with declining ardor to dis- 



perse gradually t<i their separate dens. My 

 informant remarked that the whole was so 

 quickly enacted that he sat in the saddle 

 half bewildered, scarcely able to compre- 

 hend the fleeting bit of wild drama that 

 had passed before his eyes. Even the out- 

 raged gopher, he said, had so far recover- 

 ed, that when he rode down into the colony 

 it too limped its way along and dissappear- 

 ed, leaving the prairie still and deserted. 



In regard to the hibernation of this go- 

 pher I was agreeably sui'prised. I had re- 

 ceived the impression in some manner that, 

 like the woodchucks of the east, they dis- 

 appeared in mid-8ept^ember ; instead, how- 

 ever, they braved the rigors of October and 

 even that of November. After the snow- 

 fall of October 7 the}' dug upwards through 

 the snow as numerous as ever, but the suc- 

 ceeding cold and snow put the majorit}^ 

 under by the middle of the month. On 

 October 29, near a wolf-willow clump on 

 the prairie, I noticed where an ambitious 

 individual had tunnelled along under a 

 few inches of snow for over twenty feet. 

 This subterranean work was carried at in- 

 tervals so near the surface that detached 

 portions caved in, exposing the run below. 

 In other instances, by the dirt mixed with 

 the snow, the passage seemed driven di- 

 rectly in contact Avitli the earth. For several 

 days in early November, though the mer- 

 cury was much below zero, an unusually 

 hardy animal, reluctant to assume the long 

 sleep, daily scampered to and fro be- 

 tween den holes in the snow separated by 

 several yards. 



Franklin Ground Squirrel. 



Citellus franklinii (Sabine). 



The northern range-limit of this brush- 

 land cousin of Richardson's gopher, must 

 almost coincide with that of the latter 

 "animal, from all information I could get; 

 but in point of abundance there is no com- 

 parison between the two. Richardson's 

 .squiriel is almost everywhere south of the 

 Saskatchew'an, while Franklin's seems 

 highly restricted in its range, and at Islay 

 is nearly absent. I sigjited one as it ran 

 into a l)luff near the Vermilion river on 

 Sei)temher 1, but never saw another, al- 

 though five days later on a beautiful after- 

 noon I hunted this and other promising 

 localities along tiie valley until nearly 

 night. Search for them in other localities 

 was likewise fiMiitless. Information from 



