Davis: Allegheny Cave Rat at West Point ioi 



within a foot of touching one lying beneath it. In this narrow 

 space the rats had stored their hay for about six feet. This, as 

 has been said, was open to the air on both sides and showed no 

 signs of being occupied by the rats as a nesting place, indeed 

 it would have been quite unsuitable, owing to its exposed position. 



James E. DeKay, writing of his American Black Rat, in the 

 Zoology of New York, published in 1842, mentions John G. Bell, 

 and this same Mr. Bell, according to literature, took Neotoma 

 about the year 1850, in the Palisades at Piermont, Rockland Co., 

 N. Y., which is about twenty-five miles south of West Point. 

 North of Crow's Nest Mountain Neotoma has been taken at 

 Storm King Mountain, as recorded by Dr. Allen in the Bulletin of 

 the American Museum of Natural History, 1884, Vol. VI, p. 362. 

 Mr. Samuel N. Rhoads records the cave rat from Bearfort 

 Mountain at the southern end of Greenwood Lake (Alammals of 

 Pennsylvania and New Jersey, p. 88). Mr. W. DeW. Miller and 

 James Chapin, in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of 

 Washington, April, 1909, Vol. XXII, p. 88, record it from Jefifer- 

 son Mountain, Newfoundland, N. J., which is a few miles south 

 of Mr. Rhoads's locality. On February 22, 1909, Mr. James 

 Chapin and I climbed the rocky side of Torne Mountain, near 

 Ramapo, and when quite high up we came to a ledge on which 

 were what appeared to be the droppings of a cave rat. The cave 

 rat is more common in parts of Pennsylvania and Virginia, and 

 Dr. Allen gives, in the publication above cited, even Massachusetts 

 and Connecticut records ; and a Connecticut record is given by 

 Dr. Mearns in Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural His- 

 tory, 1898, Vol. X, p. 336. Unfortunately it is doubtful if any 

 specimens have been preserved from the two states last mentioned. 



In the Revision of the Wood Rats of the Genus Neotoma by 

 Edward A. Goldman, U. S. Dept. Agric, Bureau of Biological 

 Survey, N. A. Fauna, No. 31, 1910, Neotoma pennsylvanica is 

 said to be a well-marked species, requiring no close comparison 

 with any known living form, and its range to include localities in 

 New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia, Virginia, 

 Kentucky, Tennessee and Alabama. 



