THE SQUIRRELS AND OTHER RODENTS OF THE ADIRONDACKS. T,37 



found. Besides these, they have burrows in the shores of streams, and where there 

 are dams they sometimes do considerable damage by undermining their banks. 



The woodchuck, which is about as uninteresting an animal as there is, occurs 

 rarely in the Adirondack woods, but is much more at home in the cultivated areas 

 surrounding them. Here, in the meadows or hillsides, where there is a good supply 

 of grass or clover, he digs his burrows, which often prove a nuisance to the farmer 

 with his horses. 



Still another large rodent, belonging to another family, is found in the 

 Adirondacks. This is the Canada porcupine. This curious beast, on account of 

 its formidable armature of spines, has but few enemies, of which the fisher and the 

 panther were the chief, and since these have become rare or extinct, the porcupine 

 has probably increased in numbers. Fear of man, too, is apparently lacking, or 

 more probably he has not sufficient intelligence to appreciate what man can 

 do, for he often wanders into camps and explores the surroundings in search of 

 salt in the most familiar way. A specimen the writer met this summer had 

 to be assisted with the boot before he would move from the trail. In spite of his 

 commonness he is not often seen, as he spends most of his time high in the trees, 

 where he may be mistaken for a bunch of twigs or a crow's nest. He also 

 possesses, as a permanent domicile, a den, usually among the rocks. 



Ranking next in size of the rodents, we find the rabbits, or hares, as they 

 should more properly be called, the domesticated white rabbit, which is an 

 English form, being the only one to which the term properly applies. Of these 

 there are two species found in the Adirondacks, the larger of which is known as 

 the varying hare or white hare. This species is divided into two subspecies, 

 of which one is called the northern varying hare, and is distinguished by the 

 fact that, while, like all of our other mammals, he has two coats during the year, 

 a summer and a winter one, his winter coat is a pure white, which, matching 

 the snow, enables him the more easily to escape his enemies. This change is 

 common in many of the northern mammals, and, of the New York forms, the 

 ermine and the least weasel adopt it. This subspecies is found in the forests 

 in all parts of the Adirondacks and Catskills above 1,500 feet. 



The other subspecies, the southern varying hare, which replaces the former 

 along the southern and eastern borders, lives in a region where the snow is not 

 so deep or so abundant during the winter, and as during its absence a white 

 coat would render him too conspicuous, he has adopted a mottled, lighter brown. 

 This form, according to Stone, is not holding its own very well, but has been 

 replaced to a great extent by the gray rabbit or cottontail, which is a smaller 

 and even more defenceless species than the varying hare. The cottontail occasionally 

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