190S.] 



MAMMALS. 



239 



They have been seen just north of the Mackenzie at ProYidence. A trader who 

 has spent twenty years in the North assured me that he had seen but one 

 Qsher in the Mackenzie District and tliat one was taken at Lake Bischo in 

 1881.« 



MacFarlane presents figures showing that the fisher is fairly nu- 

 merous in the Isle a la Crosse and Lesser Slave Lake regions, though 

 rarer to the northward. The northernmost post mentioned by him as 

 trading skins is Fort Simpson, which received, in 1889, 6 skins which 

 were trapped at some distance to the southward.^ 



Gulo luscus (Linn.). Hudson Bay Wolverene. 



This powerful animal occurs throughout the region now under re- 

 view north to the Arctic islands, but is nowhere common, though a 

 few skins are collected at all the posts we visited. During our trip 

 in 1901 more skins were seen at Fort Rae than at any other post, and 

 these had been iDrought mainly from the Barren Grounds, where the 

 animal occurs more commonly than in the wooded country. These 

 skins varied greatly in color. The back was usually nearly black, 

 but in some cases the entire upper parts were overlaid with yelloAvish 

 Avhite. Most of them had a broad light band on either side, generally 

 meeting on the rump, and often isolating an oval dorsal patch of 

 blackish brown or black. The face, and sometimes the throat, was 

 in most cases yellowish white. 



During the season of 1903, though tracks were seen occasionally, 

 I observed the animal only in the country between Fort Rae and 

 Great Bear Lake. A large one Avas seen on an island in Lake Maze- 

 nod, near the height of land, on August 6. On August 17, as we 

 were paddling among the numerous islands on Lake Hardisty, a 

 A\-olverene was seen to run over an exposed ledge of rock into the 

 scattering forest. We found the animal after a short search, and as 

 it stood upright to reconnoiter, killed it with a rifle shot. It proved 

 to be an old female, and evidently had a litter of young in the 

 vicinity. In the semibarren country along the southern shore of 

 Great Bear Lake, tracks of Avolverenes were common, especially near 

 Leith Point. Here certain passes between small lakes were well 

 marked Avith trails made by various animals, among which this 

 marauder was conspicuously represented by its characteristic foot- 

 prints. 



During my trip down the Mackenzie in 1904 I saw a few skins at 

 Fort Norman and Fort Good Hope, and obtained a hunter's skin at 

 the latter place. 



A large proportion of the wolverene skins which are obtained from 

 the Indians of the Mackenzie are shipped to Fort McPherson and 



« Expl. in Far North, p. 239, 1898. 



» Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., XXVIII, p. 709, 1905. 



