THE NEOTOMAS, OR PACK RATS 31 



otes, skunks, rattlesnakes, and badgers. All 

 sorts of ingenious uses of cactus joints and 

 small rocks and sticks are made in forming 

 their nests, and the pack rats' domiciles are 

 always homes full of interest to the inquisitive 

 and observant traveler. 



The mountain species and those living in 

 brushy and forested areas are given to making 

 huge stick houses either under or high up among 

 the trees. Sometimes the stacks are four or five 

 feet high and are scattered so thickly in the 

 brush of certain localities in the hill country 

 that they number between twenty and thirty 

 to the acre. These nests represent an enormous 

 amount of labor on the part of the rats. Thou- 

 sands of sticks, stones, old bones, and other 

 oddities such as empty cartridges and the like, 

 enter into their composition. Sometimes they 

 are composed largely of manure, or, as Dr. 

 Mearns found along the Colorado River, of 

 sticks and coyote melons or gourds. It has 

 always been a marvel to me to know how some 

 of the enormous sticks, bones, and fairly good- 

 sized stones are carried. Recently I found a 

 nest in Superior Valley on the Mohave Desert 



