64 
BrLLETTN OF WISCONSIN NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. VOL. 5. NO. 1. 
Considering this determination as authoritative the species 
should then be known as Puforius rixosiis allegheuiensis (Rhoads) 
which Rhoads, in Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci., Phila., Feb. 7, 1901, calls 
Allegheny Weasel and in his Mammals of Pennsylvania and New 
Jersey, 1903 p. 173 terms Alleghenian Least Weasel. 
Our specimen is No. 1363, female, Nov. 26, 1906, Burlington, 
Racine Co., Wis. The measurements taken in the flesh are : 
length of head and body, normal, 150 mm.; under tension, 160; 
tail before skinning. 29 ; vertebral measurement as determined 
after skinning, 27; manus, 13 ; pes 2t ; ear, back, 4; ear, notch to 
tip, II. Skull: condylar basilar length, 30; zygomatic width, 15; 
mastoid width, 14; interorbital constriction, 6.5. 
The species is remarkable not only from its small size, but 
also because of the extreme shortness of its tail, the vertebral part 
of which does not reach to the end of the toes in the made up 
skin and the hairs extend only about 5 mm. beyond them. The 
end of the tail appears to be entirely devoid of any suggestion of 
the dark tip common to other species of weasels, but when held 
against a white background it can be seen that about one-third 
of the terminal hairs are dark in color. 
The underparts to middle of sides are white. The upper parts 
extending on outsides of hind legs to the heels are mixed 'Svalnut 
brown" and white ; deepest brown on the occiput and nucha, be- 
coming lighter posteriorily and also laterally from the vertebral 
region. Low on the sides anteriorily as well as all the posterior 
part of the back the brown is so mixed and interrupted by white 
as to produce a clouded eftect. 
This winter has been remarkably open, there being hardly a 
trace of snow up to the time that this weasel was captured, yet 
its change to winter pelage was well advanced. 
A very large female P. novchoracensis taken Jan. 13th, 1907, 
a few miles north of Milwaukee, at Whitefish Bay, shows no indi- 
cation of assuming its white coat, whereas a good sized male 
taken a few miles south of the city at Males Corners on Nov. 11, 
1906, had changed to about the same degree as shown in our 
allci^liciiicusis. At no time up to the middle of January had 
the ground either at Burlington or about Milwaukee been entirely 
covered with snow and the little that had fallen had soon disap- 
peared. The temperature had been exceptionally high for this 
period of year. 
