Jan. 15. :898.] 
P.OHEST- AND 3TREAM. 
43 
The Red Squirrel 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
That red squirrels store food I thought was known to 
every one who haunts the bush. But here comes 
Forest and Stream, with its numerous writers that 
seem to be in doubt, and with others that claim positively 
the opposite. 
Some time ago I promised to write something about 
a red squirrel and his cute method of sprouting acorns. 
I will fulfill that promise now. 
The squirrel referred to introduced himself to me eight 
years ago last November. I was feeding corn to blue- 
jays and chipmunks, when the red came into the door- 
yard to investigate. He seemed to think well of the corn, 
and gathered in two kernels and scampered home, to 
store it away, I suppose. When he returned, the corn 
had disappeared. The bluejays and chipmunks loaded 
up with from fourteen to nineteen kernels, and made two 
trips to the red's one. The latter never carried more 
than two kernels, so was never able to get anywhere 
near an equal share until he set his "thinker" to work. 
It took just three days for the red to find out how matters 
stood, then he adopted a new method. He, would seize 
trouble when it knows there arc plenty of seeds in the 
dooryard. 
Five years ago the red squirrel moved into my door- 
yard and proclaimed himself one of the family. He 
dug two holes in the side of a bank for winter store- 
houses, and made himself a summer residence in the top 
of a sapling pine. 
He fills his storehouses every fall with something. He 
commences on hazelnuts, followed later by beechnuts, 
and, last of all, sweet acorns. He does not store up 
cone seeds unless the nut crop is a failure. During the 
summer months he has the trees around the cabin orna- 
mented with bits of bread, meat and mushrooms; later 
the bluejays come to the cabin, and the red no longer 
uses the trees for a storehouse for bread and meat. For 
thirteen years I have made use of the varieties of mush- 
rooms selected by the squirrels and wood mice as edible, 
and have had no reason to regret my confidence. 
When there are plentj^ of acorns, my squirrel, after fill- 
ing his storehouses, hides nuts around boulders, stumps 
and the holes of trees. These nuts the squirrel eats dur- 
ing the spells of warm winter weather and in tlie spring. 
When the nuts sprout and commence to grow, the squir- 
rel g"oes around, sometimes to more than a htmdred 
places, and sprouts his acorns just as a farmer sprouts his 
potatoes and for the same reason, to keep them from 
growing. These nuts are sprouted two or three times, 
and each time they are removed to a new locality. The 
jAliss ilamand will be glad to disLribuLc ihiiS(i At the I'ate 
of 40 cents a hundred copies, or 10 cGflts for twenty 
copies. The society is without funds and charges no 
membership fee. It must, tlierefore, obtain money to 
print its literature by selling it. 
Snakes in Costa Rica. 
Costa Rxca means the Rich Coast, and in most re- 
spects it is rich particularly in the snake family, the 
most deadly of which is the terrible Culebra de Sangre 
(or blood snake.) 
This variety of reptile does not grow to a large size, 
attd perhaps for that very reason is most to be dreaded, 
as it is not so easily seen. It is red, and resembles a 
large, swollen vein, ready to burst with blood. 
A short time ago I stepped on one of these snakes, 
and like a flash he struck at me, but as I had on a pair 
of leather leggins no harm was done, though it was a 
close call. Not so foitunate was a poor day laborer who 
was bitten by the same variety of snake. The man was 
working for a neighbor of mine, and I did not see him 
until the day after he was bitten. The moment I heard 
about it I went over to see the poor fellow, taking with 
me a remedy for snake bite, thinking it would do no 
harm to try it, anyway. When we reached the men's 
camp the sight that met bur eyeS was a sickening one. 
HERON GROUP. DEPARTMENT OF ORNITHOLOGY. FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. 
one kernel of corn, rush with it some 20ft. away, to a 
carpet of pine needles, thrust his nose into the needles 
and drop the kernel, after which he would make three or 
four light, airy passes with his forepaws before rushing 
back to the dooryard. The next kernel would usually 
be placed about 2oin. from the first, and the keenest eye 
could not detect that the needles had been displaced. 
After the last kernel had disappeared from the dooryard 
the red would satisfy his appetite and then carry home 
the concealed corn, two kernels at a time. 
He had a regular system in concealing corn. The first 
kernel was always placed near a landmark, the bole of a 
tree, a boulder or some other prominent object. The 
corn was dropped in a line between two landmarks. 
Sometimes there were three or four lines, but the squirrel 
never forgot the exact spot where the first kernel was 
concealed or the direction of the line. Knowing the 
direction of the line, his keen scent helped him to find 
each kernel. 
_ Some readers may doubt what follows, but others be- 
sides myself have witnessed the same thing, and proof 
does not depend on any one individual, so I feel bold to 
tell the story. The late Mr. Frank Bolles, in one of his 
visits to my cabin, suggested the experiment of removing 
a kernel of corn from the line to learn if the squirrel 
woiild miss it. Or, in other words, to find out if a 
squirrel can count. The experiment was a great surprise 
to me. When a kernel was removed, the squirrel did 
iiot seem to miss it until he had reached the end of the 
line. In some way he was then aware that his count 
did not hold out," and he would immediate- 
ly search the whole length of the line. 
He could tell if more than one kernel was missing, 
and when I threw to him the missing kernels he was 
cute enough to catch on to my trick, for after a few 
lessons he would come to me for the missing corn. If 
I withheld it, he would search the line. This power to 
count is not foreign to birds. Bluejays can count, and so 
can the diminutive chickadee. The chickadee takes from 
two to four hemp seeds at a time to a tree, and deposits 
all but one on a limb in the crevices of the bark. With 
the single seed it hunts a small twig where it can hold 
the seed while it beats off the hull. If one or two of the 
seeds on the limb are removed the chickadee will in- 
stitute a thorough search in the bark, after which it 
will drop to the ground and hunt beneath the limb. It is 
somewhat singular that a chickadee will take so much 
sprouts, which are usually about }%in. in length, may be 
seen near a fresh hole in the ground, but the imts — two 
or three, seldom more — are not to be found. 
The gray squirrel here on the Cape does not store food 
in a storehouse. If he did, the reds would rob him. Tie 
hides nuts beneath the oak trees, and his memory is sel- 
dom at fault. I have spent hours watching the grays 
ivhile about this work. I \iave often marked the spol 
where a single nut was concealed by thrusting a stick 
mto the ground. I have found that the squirrel track 
(vould lead directly to the spot, and beside the hole in 
the snow I would find the" shell of the nut, even if the 
snow was over ift. in depth. Hermit. 
Gloucester, Jan. 3. 
Infertility of the Half-Breed Goose. 
New Iberia, La., Jan. 3. — In the Dec. 25 issue I no- 
tice a query by Shaganoss if it be true that the eggs 
from a cross of the common domestic goose with the 
Canada goose (or brant as we call them here) are sterile. 
I know of . an old gentleman, Mr. Charles Mestayer, liv- 
itig near the lakes here, who has interbred these two 
difi'erent species for the last twenty years, and he claims 
that they do not lay at all, and that he has never found 
one of their eggs. He keeps up the breed by securing 
the slightly wounded ones from hunters on the Gulf 
coast. He now has a flock of about fifteen or twenty of 
this cross breed. Another instance, somewhat similar 
to the above, is the cross between the "Muscovy" and 
the common barnyard fowl known as the "puddle 
duck." This cross produces what is called the "mule 
duck," which never reproduces itself. It bears the same 
relation to bird life as the mule does to animal life. 
Hence its name. L. S. Freee. 
The Schaller Audubon Society. 
A LOCAL Audubon society has been organized by Miss 
J. E. Hamand in Schaller, Iowa, which has already done 
much good in awakening in that neighborhood an in- 
terest in and love for the birds. The field in Iowa is a 
wide one, for no State Audubon society has as yet been 
organized. This, it is hoped, will come in time. The 
Schaller Audubon Society has issued an attractive leaf- 
let, which appeals to the young on the humane side, and 
The man was bleeding from his nose, mouth and ears, 
also from his finger and toe nails. How a man could 
bleed as much as he had, and still live, was a marvel. 
He had been bitten in the foot; only one fang of the 
serpent had entered the flesh. The manager of the estate 
had given him several doses of curarina, a medicine made 
in Colombia and much used here in Central America 
for poisonous bites. We also gave him the medicine 
which I had brought with me, which made him vomit 
profusely. In a few hours' time the bleeding stopped, 
and next day the poor fellow was sent to the hospital. 
No one expected that he would live, as the bite is consid- 
ered deadly; but, strange to say, he did recover, and in 
a month's time was at work once more. If both fangs 
of the snake had entered the foot instead of one, he 
would undoubtedly have died. I have known a horse 
to die in a few hours after being bitten by one of the 
snakes. In the past three years two men in my district 
have died from snake bite, and in hunting in this country 
one must always keep a sharp lookout for snakes. 
Fred S. Lyman. 
H.^ciENDA CoLOMBiANA, Costa Rica. 
[Our correspondent would have added to the interest 
of his note if he had told us what the medicine he em- 
ployed was.] 
Field Columbian Museum. 
The persistent energy with which the work of the 
Field Columbian Museum is pushed forward is certainly 
very interesting and impressive, and the results of this 
energy are easily seen by a visit to the museum. 
Among its work, which is especially useful because it 
tends to interest a very large class^ of the public, are 
the lecture courses which are given in the autumn and 
spring by men who are leaders in their special fields of 
research. 
From the point of view of the public, however, the 
important work of the Field Museum is after - all the 
field work done and the placing on exhibi- 
tion of the collections made. At the date 
of the last report Mr. D. G. Elliott's African 
expedition was still in the field. Six months were .sp.ent 
in northern Africa, during which not only large collec- 
tions were made of mammals, birds, reptiles and fishes, 
but also the skeletons were secured of most species, as 
well as casts of heads and parts of the bodies. Collections 
