November 7, 1884.] 



SCIENCE 



445 



THE MAMMALS OF THE ADIRON- 

 DACKS. 



The mammals of the Adirondack region, north-eastern 

 New York. By Clinton Hart Merriam, 

 M.D. New York, Foster pr., 1884. 10 + 316 p. 



Few recent works on our native animals will 

 be perused with keener interest b} r the general 

 reader than Dr. Merriam' s ' Mammals of the 

 Adirondack region ; ' it being a popular narra- 

 tive of the habits of the mammals of the great 

 Adirondack wilderness, and 'in no sense,' as 

 our author states, ' a technical treatise. ' Based 

 almost wholly on original observation, in the 

 main the author's own, it differs widely from 

 the ordinary works on such subjects, every 

 page bearing strong evidence of long-con- 

 tinued, intelligently and patiently conducted 

 field-work. 



The region under consideration occupies por- 

 tions of twelve counties, and has an area about 

 one hundred and twent} T miles square. It is 

 made up of mountains and short ranges of high 

 hills, which, conforming to no regular axis, con- 

 stitute irregular groups of isolated peaks, nearly 

 thirty of which attain a height of three thou- 

 sand feet, while five exceed five thousand. The 

 region is everywhere studded with beautiful 

 lakes, two of which are more than four thou- 

 sand feet above sea-level. The western border 

 of the area has an altitude of about a thousand 

 feet ; the land rises thence eastwardly to its 

 highest part, along the eastern border, where 

 the elevation falls abruptly to the level of Lake 

 George, three hundred and forty-three feet 

 above the sea. The region is mainly covered 

 with evergreen forests, composed very largely 

 of a single genus (Abies) of coniferous trees. 



Owing to the elevation and northern position, 

 the fauna of the Adirondacks is distinctly and 

 almost purely ' Canadian.' Snow covers the 

 ground for nearly half the year, with a mid- 

 winter average of over four feet in depth. Dur- 

 ing this season the temperature often falls to 

 — 25° F., and sometimes to —40° F. ; while 

 '•variations of forty, fifty, and sixty degrees 

 Fahrenheit are by no means uncommon," and a 

 fall of over sevent}* degrees in fifteen hours has 

 been observed. 



With its isolation, its almost unbroken 

 forests, and its peculiar topographic and cli- 

 matic features, no region of equal extent east 

 of the Rocky Mountains, doubtless, offers so 

 great attractions to the naturalist. 



Dr. Merriam, in his ' General introduction,' 

 devotes some sixteen pages to the topographic, 

 climatic, floral, and faunal features of the re- 



gion, and then treats in detail the forty-six 

 species enumerated, in systematic order. Two 

 of the species (harbor-seal and fox-squirrel) 

 are given as accidental stragglers ; and it is 

 presumed that one or two shrews, and two or 

 three bats, are still to be added to the list. The 

 wolverine, moose, and elk are recorded as 

 extirpated, the last moose having been killed 

 about 1861, while the elk and the wolverine 

 have not been seen there for nearly half a 

 century. 



Dr. Merriam writes, in the main, tersely and 

 in good taste ; although his impatience with 

 popular fallacies leads him here and there to 

 almost undue positiveness of expression, even 

 though his position may be unassailable. His 

 pages are replete with information gathered 

 from personal observation and from trust- 

 worthy hunters and guides, and show a famil- 

 iarit} T with the region and its natural productions 

 which only long experience could give. Par- 

 ticularly noteworthy is his account of the pan- 

 ther (Felis concolor), which, owing to the 

 bount}' placed upon it by the ' state ' in 1871, 

 is now approaching extirpation. Contrary to 

 current opinion and the authority of respectable 

 authors, this animal is represented as " one of 

 the most cowardly of beasts, never attacking 

 man unless wounded and cornered." The 

 wolf, common twelve years ago, is now com- 

 paratively rare, the special cause of the de- 

 crease not being obvious. 



Nineteen very interesting and entertaining 

 pages are devoted to the skunk, — apparently 

 a special favorite of our author, — in which a 

 number of popular fallacies are exposed, among 

 them the belief that the bite of the skunk is 

 usually fatal through giving rise to a peculiar 

 kind of hydrophobia, which has been named 

 'rabies mephitica.' Dr. Merriam claims that 

 a bite from a healthy skunk is in no "way dan- 

 gerous, as he has found by personal experience, 

 but that skunks, like other animals, are sub- 

 ject to rabies, and, when thus afflicted, are 

 of course dangerous. 



There are thirty pages which relate to the 

 common Virginia deer, the only existing 

 ungulate of the region, in which the matter 

 of ' spike-horn bucks ' very naturally receives 

 special attention. In 1869 a writer in the 

 American naturalist stated that he had hunted 

 deer in the Adirondacks for twent3~-one years, 

 but not till within the last fourteen years had 

 he begun to hear of spike-horn bucks. " The 

 stories about them multiplied, and the}' evi- 

 dently became more and more common from 

 3 r ear to } T ear. . . . These spike-horn bucks are 

 now [1869] frequently shot in all that portion 



