30 DOMESTICATED ANIMALS AND PLANTS 
Unused materials. It has been frequently mentioned that the 
world might have been much richer in domesticated races if it 
had seemed worth while, or if we had really set about it. 
The bison, whether European or American, would have made 
a good domestic animal of the cattle kind. The quagga could 
be domesticated if we needed him. The bighorn of the Rockies 
would make a sheep, and the peccary or the wild boar would 
make a pig. The prairie hen would make a better fowl than 
the guinea hen, and any number of new dogs could be devel- 
oped from the foxes and the wolves. 
The wild rice of our northern lakes would make an excel- 
lent grain for lowlands. The milkweed may have possibilities 
as a fiber plant. Many of our native fruits and nuts have never 
been domesticated, and it is a startling fact that our original 
native grasses of the prairie, numbering many species, are being 
allowed to disappear without contributing a single new race to 
our cultivated grasses, — this, too, in face of the fact that we 
have yet no grass without a serious defect. 
Except for the difficulty of restraint, the deer and the antelope 
would make valuable domesticated animals. The semidomesti- 
cation of the skunk has already begun on the great skunk farms 
where they are raised in numbers for their skins. The frightful 
odor of this animal when on the defensive has given him an 
evil reputation, but in truth he is a most gentle animal, with 
much the disposition of the cat and without its savage ways. 
The flesh is exceedingly sweet and tender, and it is altogether 
likely that this little beast may yet become more nearly domes- 
ticated than will ever be possible with the ostrich, which seems 
incapable of affection. 
Lost possibilities. Without a doubt many an animal or plant 
now extinct would have made a most valuable domesticated 
species, had it been taken in time. It is difficult to give ex- 
amples because we know so little of extinct species, and because 
it is impossible to make direct comparisons between a domesti- 
cated and a wild race, either of the same or a different species. 
