1908.] 



MAMMALS. 



211 



miles south of Henry House in July, and in similar situations be- 

 tween Jasper House and Smoky River in the early autumn. He killed 

 one on Grand Cache Eiver, about TO miles north of Jasper House, on 

 September 3. It measured : Total length 811, tail vertebrae 105, hind 

 foot '2'27. Another was killed in Rodent Valley, 25 miles west of 

 Henry House, on October 15. Its stomach contained remains of 

 Mkrotus and Synaptomys. Its measurements were 872, 93, 222. In 

 the Biological Survey collection are skulls from the following points 

 in Alberta : Snake Lake, 20 miles west of Red Deer ; McLeod River 

 (near crossing west of Edmonton): Cache Pecotte; and 10 miles 

 northeast of Jasper House. These skulls are not separable from 

 specimens from eastern Canada. 



Lynx canadensis mollipilosus Stone. Xorthern Canada Lynx. 



A skull in the National Museum, taken by C. P. Gaudet at Peel 

 River (Fort McPherson), as well as skulls from several points in 

 northern Alaska, differs from skulls of typical L. canadensis from 

 eastern Canada in some particulars, notabh^ in having slender post- 

 orbital processes, a character of subspecies moUijnlosus. Another 

 skull which I obtained at Fort McPherson does not have the slender 

 postorbitals attributed to this form, and differs from ordinary skulls 

 of L. canadensis only in having the bullae very much flattened. It 

 is in all probability abnormal in this respect. Xo skins from this 

 region being available for study, it is uncertain whether the skin 

 characters attributed to mollipilosus are found in the Peel River 

 animal, but it is highly probable that such is the case. 



Canis occidentalis Richardson. Gray Wolf. 



Gray or timber wolves are found throughout the wooded parts 

 of the region, and are fairly abundant and apparently increasing in 

 some sections. In 1901 we saw numerous skins at nearly all the posts 

 visited, and found a skull at a trapper's cabin on Slave River, 10 

 miles below the mouth of the Peace. Among a number of skins seen 

 at Fort Rae, most of which were in the normal or gray phase, was 

 one the color of which was mainly dark bluish gray ; the throat and 

 back were nearly black, the latter flecked with a few white hairs; 

 the chest had a white patch ; the belly and tail were bluish gray, the 

 latter blackish toward the tip. 



During the season of 1903 we heard that wolves had been rather 

 abundant for several years past in the region west of Smith Land- 

 ing, in the Birch Mountains, and in the vicinity of Athabaska Land- 

 ing. Tracks were seen at various points along Slave River and on 

 my route between Fort Rae and Great Bear Lake. Late in August, 

 on the large semibarren tract east of Leith Point, on the south shore 

 of Great Bear Lake, my Indian canoeman wounded a large black 



