230 



NOKTH AMEKICAN FAUNA. 



[xo. 27. 



and after a short search found it partially hidden beneath a bowlder, 

 where it had been dragged by a mink which was still engaged with it. 

 I set a small steel trap, and while holding it by the chain with one 

 hand I seized the fish by the tail and gently led the mink into the trap. 



I saw no minks about Fort Franklin, where the species was said 

 by the Indians to be rare. While ascending the Mackenzie to Fort 

 Simpson in October I frequently noted tracks, and on one occasion 

 saw a mink on the river bank. I found it to be rather common about 

 Fort Simpson, where numbers are annually traded. Many are 

 obtained also at Forts Norman and Good Hope. 



Skins and skulls from this region are not essentially different 

 from specimens of L. energumenos from southern British Columbia, 

 and it seems best to refer the interior mink to this form. A skull 

 in the National Museum from Fort Good Hope has the broad ros- 

 trum of Lutreola mgens of Alaska, and it is probable that the mink 

 of the lower Mackenzie is referable to this form. 



During his exploring trip to the Anderson River region in the 

 summer of 1857 MacFarlane noted the mink on Lockhart River." 

 In a recent paper he states that it occurs along the Anderson and 

 other Arctic rivers to the coast. The usual number of young are said 

 by him to be five or six, though as many as twelve had been re- 

 ported.^ Russell states that the mink is rare at the mouth of the 

 Mackenzie.^ 



While in the Jasper House region in 1895 and 1896 J. Alden 

 Loring found the mink to be common throughout most of that sec- 

 tion, and obtained skulls from 40 miles northeast of Jasper House, 

 Whitemud, and Moose Creek. 



Putorius cicognanii (Bonaparte). Bonaparte Weasel. 



This weasel occurs in the mountains of Alberta, and in all proba- 

 bility northward to the region of the upper Peace River, or beyond. 

 A young weasel taken by J. Alden Loring in the mountains 15 

 miles south of Henry House, July 21, 1896, is referable to this species. 

 Another weasel was seen in Rodent Valley, 25 miles west of Henry 

 House, in October of the same year. Two specimens in winter 

 pelage from St. Albert, Alberta, are intermediate between P. rich- 

 ardsoni and cicognanii^ and some of our Athabaska River specimens, 

 though referred to P. richardsoni^ also show a tendency in the direc- 

 tion of cicognanii. A female weasel from near Fort Providence also 

 approaches so closely to cicognanii in characters as to suggest that P. 

 richardsoni and cicognanii must intergrade from about that point 



« Canadian Record of Science, IV, p. 32, 1890. 

 » Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., XXYIII, p. 714, 1905. 

 ^ Expl. in Far North, p. 238, 1898. 



