MAMMALS OF PENNSYLVANIA AND NEW JERSEY. I37 



Lycoming Co. — One was killed near Roaring Branch in 1896.— Babcock. 



McKean Co, — " The following circumstantial account of the capture of a 

 lynx by an old Pa. hunter of long experience should remove any doubts as to 

 the former existence of Z. canadensis in Pa. : 



Jamestown, N. Y., Nov. 30, i8gg. 

 Samuel N. Rhoads, Esq. 



Dear Sir : I notice [in a local newspaper] an article inviting any person 

 having knowledge of certain animals found in Pennsylvania subject to extinc- 

 tion to give a brief account of same. I had a camp on Kinzua Creek, Mc- 

 Kean Co., Pa., where my partner and I spent twelve falls hunting and trap- 

 ping, from 1855 to 1867. In Dec, 1867, 1 killed a deer and hung the fore 

 quarters up on a tree as high as I could reach, taking the saddle into camp. 

 The next evening but one I came that way and found that some animal of 

 the cat kind had come within about 10 feet of the tree and sprung upon the 

 meat ; had made a meal and jumped back into and followed away on the 

 same tracks by which it came. * * * Next morning I went back and set a 

 trap in the place where he left the ground to make his spring. The third 

 morning after I found my trap and clog gone and following up the trail found 

 him up a hemlock tree about 30 feet from the ground, trap and all. The 

 chain was wound around a large limb twice, and he hanging by one fore leg 

 caught in the trap, dead, frozen stiff. I went back to camp, got an axe and 

 cut the tree down to secure trap and game. I found a nice specimen of 

 Canadian Lynx, weighing about 40 lbs. I judged so by hefting and compar- 

 ing him with my still-hunting dog whose weight I knew. I took his pelt off 

 and sold it with my other hides, not realizing that it was of any particular 

 value as a specimen. It was considerably taller on legs than a wildcat, longer 

 body, of a light gray, tail 6 to 8 inches in length, and the funniest thing about 

 it was its ears, which had stiff black hairs coming out from the inside of the 

 ear, and growing up and coming to a point at the end of the ears, then twist- 

 ing around like an old-fashioned horse-hair fish line for about 14 of an inch. 

 Right atop of this was formed a round ball of the black hair about as big as 

 a blue plum, so that when you held the head up and shook it a little, the 

 little bells on top of the ears would jump around in all shapes. Another 

 hunter that lives in that vicinity by the name of Aaron Parmeter, post office 

 address Kinzua, Warren Co., Pa., killed one about the same date while he 

 was watching for deer at a salt lick one evening. I have not hunted any in 

 Pa. for the past 25 years, but I think that they still exist in N. W. Pennsyl- 

 vania, and that a specimen can be had even now. * * * 



"Respectfully yours, Thos. J. Fenton." 



" The Lynx was never plenty in northwestern Pennsylvania. My father. 



