PRELIMINARY LIST OF THE MAMMALS OF NEW YORK 301 



1842 Elaphus americanus De Kay. Zoology of New York, Mam- 

 malia, p. 120. 

 1884 Cervus canadensis Merriam, Linn. soc. New York. Trans. 2:45. 



Type locality. Eastern Canada. 



Faunal position. Boreal and transition zones. 



Habitat. Forests. 



Distribution in New York. While the eastern wapiti formerly occurred 

 throughout the state it has been extinct since the early part of the pres- 

 ent century. In Pennsylvania the animal was not exterminated till 

 within the past 40 years (Rhoads, '97c, p. 207-8). 



Principal records. De Kay : " The stag is still found in the state of 

 New- York but very sparingly and will doubtless be extirpated before 

 many years. Mr Beach, an intelligent hunter on the Raquet, assured 

 me that in 1836 he shot at a stag (or as he called it an elk) on the north 

 branch of the Saranac. He had seen many of the horns, and describes 

 this one as much larger than the biggest buck (C. virginianus), with 

 immense long and rounded horns, with many short antlers. His account 

 was confirmed by another hunter, Vaughan, who killed a stag at nearly 

 the same place. They are found in the northwestern counties of Penn- 

 sylvania and the adjoining counties of New-York. In 1834, I am 

 informed by Mr Philip Church, a stag was killed at Bolivar, Allegany 

 co. My informant saw the animal and his description corresponds 

 exactly with this species " ('42, p. 119). "In the cabinet of the Lyceum 

 of natural history, New York, is a portion of a pair of horns attached to 

 a fragment of skull, dug up near the mouth of the Raquet river in this 

 state ... A horn of the second year's growth was thrown out by a 

 plough on Grand Isle [Lake Champlain] " ('42, p. 120-21). 



Merriam quotes De Kay and adds, " I do not regard the above 

 account of Messrs Beach and Vaughan as trustworthy for the reason 

 that I have never been able to find a hunter in this wilderness, however 

 aged, who had ever heard of a living elk in the Adirondacks. That 

 the American elk . . . was at one time common in the Adirondacks 

 there is no question. A number of their antlers have been discovered, 

 the most perfect of which that I have seen is in the possession of 

 Mr John Constable. It was found in a bog on Third lake of Fulton 

 Chain in Herkimer co. Dr C. C. Benton, of Ogdensburg, has 

 several specimens. . . . These specimens were discovered at Steele's 

 Corners in St. Lawrence county. Mr Calvin V. Graves, of Boonville, 

 N. Y. has two sections of elk horns that were 'ploughed up in an old 

 beaver meadow in Diana,' Lewis co." ('84d, p. 45-47). 



