JOURNAL 



OF THE 



ASIATIC SOCIETY OF BENGAL, 



Vol. JLXX. Part II. — NATURAL SCIENCE. 



No. II.— 1901. 



VI.— Wolf Hybrids in Gilgit.—By Major J. Manners-Smtth. V.C, C.T.E. 

 [Read 7th August, 1901.] 



Dulling the last few years, since about 1897 a species of wild dog, 

 bred as it would seem from a true wolf and a domestic villag? dog has 

 existed round the village of Minawar some 9 miles from Gilgit. 



The first specimen which I saw was by moonlight at Jutial some 

 3 miles from Gilgit in December, 1898, or in Januar}^, 1899. At the time 

 I mistook the beast for a wild dog {Cyan), it being evident from its 

 general appearance that it was not a wolf ; and I had not then heard of 

 the hybrids. 



The animal was exactly like the specimen the skin and skull ol 

 which was sent to the Indian Museum in May, 1901, and like a live 

 bitch which is still in my possession and the photograph of which ia 

 attached. 



The next specimen 1 saw was my bitch " Jungly." She was 

 brought in as a puppy in May, J 899. In appearance she was sooty 

 coloured with ears that drooped forward. The villagers who brought her 

 declared that she was a wolf and that they had seen the mother dis- 

 tinctly. The other puppies with her some 4 or 5 in number had, they said, 

 escaped. 1 unfortunately did not institute any enquiries at the time, 

 still thinking that the puppy was that of a wild dog and that t)ie vil- 

 lagers did not know or recognise the difference between wolves and 

 wild dogs. 



J. Jl. 19 



