1322 



ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY BULLETIN 



YAK CALF 



A Mush-Ox Bull Becomes Savage. — For five 

 years our large bull musk-ox remained passive 

 and docile^ but his demeanor has suddenly 

 changed. Without warning the animal suddenlj- 

 turned upon his keepers, and ever since thai: 

 time he has made persistent attacks upon the 

 corral fencC;, the doors of the shelter build- 

 ing and the walls of his stall. Fence posts 

 were loosened, doors completely shattered and 

 so much damage was done that the animal was 

 shut in while his environment was materially 

 strengthened with angle iron, steel tubing and 

 heavy girders. The histories of the few captive 

 musk-ox that have attained adult age have quite 

 paralleled our experience with this one. The 

 bull that was kept at Woburn Park, England, 

 in 1903, was very savage and aggressive. 



Wild Deer in New York. — Each year we re- 

 ceive many telephone calls informing us that 

 deer have been observed in the open sections 

 north and east of the Zoological Park. Observ- 

 ers generally believe these deer have escaped 

 from the Park ranges. There appears to be a 

 fair number of wild white-tailed deer in lower 

 Westchester County, and these wander south- 

 ward along the stretch of woods bordering Cen- 

 tral and Jerome Avenues, and the Hudson River. 

 One of these deer recently investigated the citj' 

 proper, passed through the populous Tremont 

 section, thence down the Grand Concourse, and 

 into the cellar area of an apartment on Col- 

 lege Avenue, where he was corralled hj the 

 police. Our keepers were sent to capture and 

 crate the animal, but the deer had been injured 

 in an endeavor to leap over an iron fence, and 



it died within a few hours. The animal was 

 a two-year old female of the white-tailed deer 

 species. Several other wild deer have been 

 caught inside the city limits, and turned over to 

 us. 



Ape Finger-prints. — In filling the request of 

 a scientific correspondent, we recently made fin- 

 ger prints, with lamp-black solution, of our 

 young orang-utan "Datu." The work so inter- 

 ested the keepers that prints were made of 

 "Datu's" entire hand, and of the hands of sev- 

 eral of the monkeys, also. It was surprising to 

 compare the similarity of those impressions with 

 those of human hands. The "whorl," and va- 

 rious other specific lines that interest the palm- 

 ist, were present in striking variety. Possibly, 

 here is a field for study which has been neg- 

 lected ! 



The Play of an Elephant. — Khartoum, our 

 male African elephant from the Sudan, contin- 

 ues to grow and to cut up capers at the same 

 time. Recently, the keepers jorovided him with 

 a large section of a tree-trunk, as a plaything. 

 This particularly heavy object was selected be- 

 cause in former times the playthings given to 

 the elephant often were hurled at visitors, of 

 course, in a playful spirit. For an hour or more 

 Khartoum rolled the log around the stall, and 

 evinced every indication of being much amused. 

 Then, when Keeper Thuman for a moment went 

 into the feed room, the elephant stood the stump 

 on end in the middle of the stall floor, carefully 



AN ACROBATIC BUCK 



