URSUS AMERICAN US. g5 



all sorts of fruits, green corn, &c. at low water feeds much on oysters, 

 will watch their opening, and with its paw snatch out the fish; some- 

 times is caught in the shell, and kept there till drowned by the com- 

 ing in of the tide: fond also of crabs: climbs very nimbly up trees: 

 hunted for its skin; the fur next to that of the beaver, being excellent 

 for making hats.""'' 



Family Ursid.K. 



URSUS AMERICANUS i^^^n^s. 



Black Bear. 



This plantigrade mammal, the largest and most powerful of the in- 

 habitants of the Adirondacks, is still abundant in most parts of the 

 Wilderness. His proper home is within the deep evergreen forests, 

 but he is something of a rover and at certain seasons, particularly in 

 autumn, makes numerous excursions into the surrounding country. 



Notwithstanding the carnivorous position of the Bear he x'r, par ex- 

 cellence an omnivorous beast, and his larder consists not only of mice 

 and other small mammals, turtles, frogs, and fish; but also, and large- 

 ly, of ants and their eggs, bees and their honey, cherries, blackberries, 

 raspberries, blueberries and various other fruits, vegetables, and roots. 

 He sometimes makes devastating raids upon the barn-yard, slaying 

 and devouring sheep, calves, pigs, and poultry. In confinement he 

 shares with the inmates of the hog-pen whatever is left from his 

 master's table. 



He delights in tearing open old stumps and logs in search of the 

 ants that make their homes in such situations.! and digs out the nests 

 of the " yellow-jackets." devouring both the wasps themselves and the 

 comb containing their honey and grubs. So fond is he of honey 

 that he never misses an opportunity to rob a " bee tree," manifesting 



* Synopsis of Quadrupeds, 1771, pp. 199-200. 



f While tisliing in tlie Xorth P.ay of Big Moose Lake, during the summer of 1S81, Mr. Harry 

 Hurreli Miller, of Xew York city, heard a Hear tearing down an old slump that stood on a point in 

 the bay. His guide, Richard Crego, noiselessly paddled him to the spot and he killed the Bear with 

 one ball from his rille. Its stomach contained al)out a (|uart of ants and their eggs. 



