FOREST AND STREAM, 
[March 25, iSgg. 
whose camps are on Katahdin Lake, Me., say that three 
cubs is the largest number of which they have knowledge, 
and that two cubs with an old she, or even one, is much 
more common. Mr. Cushman says bear.s aA^erage about 
the same as deer in the rAtmber of young to a birth. 
Willie Paulson, from the upper Ottawa, says three cubs 
is the largest number of which he has knowledge. 
E. E. Sumner, Saranac Lake. N. Y., says he has seen 
three in a litter, but that this number is very unusual. 
Wm. E. Cushman, of Sherman, Me., says the average 
number of cubs is two, but that he has seen three. 
W. S. McKennei^ of Patten, Me., says he has never 
seen more than two cubs with the mother bear. 
Bazile Maurice says the same thmg. 
Cary Wright, Salmon > Idaho, says he never saw more 
than two. 
Beebe Sivette, St. Raymond, Que., says the common 
number of cubs seen with an old bear is one. Occasion- 
ally, however, two or three cubs are seen, but never fuur. 
Warren W. Cole, Long Lake, N. Y., has killed an old 
bear and three cubs at one time. 
F, C. Chase, of Newcomb, in the Adirondacks, knows 
pf similar instances, but says two cubs are more fre- 
quently met with in company with the mother. 
Natey Fogg says a Maine hunter named McPheeters 
claims to have seen four cubs Avith the old bear near tlie 
head of Nicotous Lake. He captured two of the cubs 
alive, and said that two others which had been in their 
compau}"^ escaped. 
Jack Darling also used to tell of following in the snow 
one winter the tracks of four small bears and one large 
one. He seemed to think, however, that this old bear 
might have taken the orphan cubs of some other bear 
under her protection. 
The men whose names are mentioned are all bear hun- 
ters of experience, and representative of a large extent 
of bear country. Not one of them has certain knowledge 
of four cubs reared by one bear mother at one time, 
which shows at least that such events are of extreme in- 
frequency. 
It is. of course, possible that iit many instances more 
than three cubs at a time may be born to wild bears, and 
that Hmited food resources prevent the survival of the en- 
tire number. As touching on this point, Mr. Sumner 
mentions the fact that while on one occasion exploring 
a she-bear's den that had just been vacated he found the 
body of a dead cnh without scratch or mark to indicate 
a violent death. Apparently the mother had been unable 
to supply sufficient' nourishment and the cub had died of 
starvation. 
Oddities 
Warren W. Cole, of Long Lake, saw a deer killed. by 
Grin Lapelle at Flatfish Lake, Hamilton county, N. Y., 
that had five legs. The superfluous member started from 
the gambrel joint of the right hindleg and terminated in 
a perfect ho.of. Mr. Cole tells of a very old and very 
large bear ki'lled as it was coming out of its den on Van- 
derwalker Mountain which was estimated to weigh 6oolbs. 
Its cleaned hide weighed SQ^lhs., and twelve and a half 
gallons of oil were tried out from its fat. This bear's 
nose was full, of porcupine quills and it had lost one foot 
in a trap. It had also been shot years before through the 
middle of its body. The ball, which was found lying next 
the skin on the opposite side from that where it entered, 
was from an old-fashioned muzzle-loading rifle,* and the 
mark of the patch was still in evidence. 
Ranson Palmer killed a deer near Long Lake that had 
carried a bullet in its heart for a considerable period. The 
wound had healed perfectly and the deer was fat and in 
fine condition. Dr. Wallace, of Philadelphia, has the 
heart preserved in alcohol, with the bullet, just as it was 
found. 
E. J. Chase, of Newcomb, N. Y., killed a horned doe 
near the Adirondack upper works eight or nine years 
ago. The horns were spikes 6 or Sin. in lengtli. The ani- 
mal was a young doe and had never bred. 
Fayette Moody, Saranac, Lake, killed a horned doe 
with three prongs on each antler. 
E. R. Starbird, Brunswick, Me., has killed two albino 
deer. He has protographs showing a number of albinos 
killed at different points in Maine, and.it seems that al- 
binos are perhaps more abundant in the Pine Tree State 
than elsewhere. 
Mr. Hall, of Trout Brook Farm, Me., says that old 
Con Dohaney tells a story of felling an elm tree across 
Soper Brook one fall from which to dip up water for 
camp use. The next spring when he returned to the spot 
he found that beaver had used the log for the basis of a 
dam spiling down from it after the fashion of lumbermen. 
Mr. Samuel L. Crosby exhibits a blue-black trout from 
Rangeley, taken by a member of the Oguossoc AngUng 
Association trolling in Mooselumaguntic Lake. The 
trout is remarkable, says Mr. Crosby, because it is found 
nowhere else on the continent. The specimen is a slen- 
der, handsome fish, weighing i}i\hs. 
Moose Shanks 
When Willie Paulson wanted a suit of clothes he went 
out and shot a caribou to get them, and up in Maine 
every tune a hunter kills a moose he gets a pair of shoei. 
Capt. Edgar E. Harlow, of Moosehead Lake, exhibited a 
piir of moose shank moccasins which hrd been stripped 
from the hind gambrel joints of a moot.e and partially 
tanned with soapsuds and salt and alum to prevent the 
hair coming out. The only sewing required was a few 
stitches across the narrow part of the shank, whicli now 
formed the toe of the mocccasins. A strip of skin was 
run around the top so that the moccasin could be drawn 
firmly about the ankle of the wearer. 
Back in the woods, when a moose is killed all that is 
necessary to convert the shanks into footgear after they 
are stripped from the moose are two wooden skewers. 
The small ends are bent back on themselves and fastened 
with skewers and there you are. The woodsman throws 
them in a pail of water at night to keep soft,- and doesn't 
bother to tan them. 
Everybody remembers how Davy Crockett met an 
emergency when there was a demand for ready cash, 
which he did not possesss, by going out and shooting a 
coon and hypothecating the skin. I'he expedient of levy- 
ing on wild nature for the wherewithal to meet pecuniary 
obligations suggests itself naturally to woodsmen. It is 
not every one, however, who has the wit to put the idea 
to good account. This is the way Natey Fogg drew his 
check for $5; 
"When Mose and I went up to Sebois Grand Lake to 
build a hovel for the horses," says Natey, "we expected 
to stay there all summer and into the hunting season. 
We took rifles and grub along, but very foolishly forgot 
about our money and had very little cash between us. 
"The mosquitoes and flies were awful bad, and before 
we got the hovel lialf finished 1 made up my mind that 
I wasn't going to stay there a minute longer than I 
could help. T needed more than I had with me to get 
home, for railroad fare and other expenses on the way, 
and it would have taken no end of time and trouble to 
go out to Patten and write home for it and wait till it 
came, so I made up my mind the money had to be forth- 
coming right where we were. There were some old bear 
traps in the camp, and I took one of them and caught a 
string of pickerel and set the trap in that burned land 
near the head of White Horse Lake, in a likely looking 
place for bear, and went back to work on the hovel. 
"That next week the mosquitoes were worse than ever. 
Mose said the only way to get the better of them was 
to sleep with an iron kettle over your head and a ham- 
mer in your liand, so that when a mosquito drove his 
bill through the kettle you could rivet it in the inside with 
the hammer and hold him there. I tried to rout them 
out by making a tire in a tin pail and raising rt. smoke. 
I went to sleej) one night with the pail over my head. 
.After a while i woke up with the side of m}' face kind 
of warm and found that the pail had set fire to the bed- 
ding, and burnt up half of my pillow and the corner of 
the mattress and part of my blankets, and was eating 
through the floor. 
"A¥ell, as I was saying, the mosquitoes was mighty 
bad, and I wanted to get out. I hadn't much faith in 
that bear trap, but as soon- as the hovel was finished I 
went down to look at it, and when I got there the trap 
was gorie. T followed up the trail, and after a while I 
found the bear in a place where the trees grew just about 
as thick as the hairs on a dog. He had wound the chain 
around two little firs and that held him; but to get a good 
sight on him I had to walk up within less than isft. His 
hide wasn't any good, but there was $5 bounty on it, 
and I'd rather be chewed by a bear any day than eaten 
alive by mosquitoes, so I got right down into that hole, 
and when I got my chance I fired and killed the bear. 
The next morning I took the hide in my canoe and went 
out to Patten and collected the bounty, and then I made 
tracks for home." J. B. Burnham. 
. The Yellowstone Park Game, 
Yellowstone Park^ March 13. — Editor Forest and 
Stream: I'm home once more. I find a hard winter here 
— hard in every respect. I see lots of game everywhere 
I have been since my return to the Park, and much of it 
is looking very tliin, and the conditions ar-e such that 
there wiJl be considerable loss. One of the good things 
that has happened here is the kilhng of seven mountain 
lions, whil^ down the river a few miles and clo.se to the 
Park boundary three others were killed. These animals 
are the worst poachers we have in the Park. They are 
very destructive to sheep and deer, for deer, being 
smaller than elk, it takes so many more to feed them. 
I came up here the other afternoon on the mail sled, 
putting in my titne locating and counting the bands of 
deer and other game along the road. I .saw five bahds of 
mule deer close to the road, counting five, sixteen twenty- 
four, fifteen and twenty-eight. There were old ones, too, 
here and there between the bands and bunches of three 
and lone whitetails. I did not see any sheep while com- 
ing up, but before we left Gardiner I was looking at them 
with a glass on the bench back of the Eagle's Nest and 
cliffs, and McMinn bench. I saw hundreds of elk before 
starting up, but only a few in sight of the road after we 
entered the canon. The day was rather bright and wanu 
for game to be out very much in sight, still I counted 
several small bands along the side of Mt. Everts, one of 
thirti^-four. Antelope I saw before starting, but not one 
from the road. Still, I saw several trails where they had 
crossed both the road and Gardiner River. Unfortunate- 
ly, I saw many coyote tracks, and lately I have heard 
their very disagreeable howl. They are back here in 
considerable numbers, but not as bad as two years ago. 
I saw less bird life along the river, but there is yet quite 
a number of ducks. 
One always sees fish in tlie Gardiner when the water 
and day are clear. I saw a' few, but could not tell what 
kind of trout they were. Lately those who catch fish 
here get three kinds of trout — native trout, brook trout 
(of the East) and Loch Leven, the two last from plants 
made by the United States Fish Commission on the 
upper waters. I saw several Loch Leven of ij^lbs. each. 
This is very interesting fishing, as one is wading through 
warm water one moment, and the next is on the banks 
in I to 2ft. of snow. Often the line is frozen in a moment 
while out of the water. 
Reaching the Springs and Ft. Yellowstone, I saw in 
the inclosure for game the five bulls I captured while 
young and two wild cows. I learned from Capt. James 
"B. Erwin that they were taken from an old corral or 
pen where he has two whitetail deer. The captain pro- 
poses to add all kinds of park animals to his collection 
for the benefit of the visitors, who, traveling wagon 
roads, as they do, see so little of the great amount of 
animal life in the Park. This collection will give them a 
near view. The Captain says his scouts and men at sta- 
tions have reported in all fifty bufifalo, twelve of these 
being calves. I won't say where they are, except this: 
They are in the Park, and it would not be healthy for 
any one to attempt to get one. They are to be left undis- 
turbed by everybody. 
Several important changes have been made since I left 
here last fall. One, granting the transportation company 
the right to build permanent camps, like the Wylie Camp- 
ing Company's; another, the rumored sale of the hotels 
to Dr. Seward Webb and associates. An order from the 
Interior Department greatly restricts the number of li- 
censes to be granted to private teams, and in no case will 
more than one license be granted to one man, and that 
for one wagon only; also requiring the holder to accom- 
pany his wagon during the trip. Another order permits 
these licensed teams to carry their parties to the hotels 
if they wish or camp where before they were compelled 
to camp. 
Capt. Erwin's scouts and men stationed at Soda Butte 
report the elk in- the. East Fork country very thin and 
weak. They say that they have to make some of them 
get out of the road or else must nm into them on their 
snowshoes. There are thousands of elk in the northern 
section of the Park, and unless we have an early spring- 
there will be a great loss later. I am sure of this by the 
way range horses are starving. There is deeper snow ly- 
ing on a level along the- foothills and in the Yellowstone 
Valley than for many years. It is a harder winter in this 
section than the winter of '86 and '87. when there was, 
.such a great loss of stock. At this date the snow at the 
altitude of Gardiner and Cinnabar is almost a sheet of 
ice, 
A good many coyotes are killed, They are shot on sight. 
Some wolves are said to have been killed in the northeriii 
part of the Park; one man claims that he got six wolves 
and four coyotes near Yancey's. There is no mail route 
now tlu-ough the Park to Cooke City. One must snow- 
shoe it to get there or to Soda Butte or "Uncle John's" 
if they wish to see game.. Standing in the streets of Gar- 
diner one day and looking into the Park, I saw bands of 
elk in hundreds and bands of antelope, in all about 150, 
sixteen mountain sheep and a few black and whitetail 
deer. Had I taken time and looked carefully I could 
have seen coyotes, but I did iiot want to see them. 
E. HOFER. 
Notes on Park Moose. 
From November, 1896, to the time of their death in 
December, 1897, a- pair of New Brunswick moose were 
an attraction and subjects of much interest at our Roger 
Williams Park, in Providence, R. I. 
The develcpraent of antlers of the male seemed a mat- 
ter of some interest, and with the assistance of the park 
officials and friends with their cameras, I have secured 
some photographs showing the size and form of these 
antlers at certain dates. It is impossible to give the exact 
date at which this growth started. Through the winter 
the pedicles on which the antlers grew were bare and 
prominent spots. At length these show an increased 
prominence, begin to lengthen, the velvet appears on them 
and the new antlers are in process of growth. This 
change began to occur in the latter part of March, and 
by May 8 the new growths were 7 or Sin. long. At this 
time the beams were straight round, and the full diameter 
they were to attain. Then there was a broadening and 
flattening at the end of each beam, followed by a division, 
and May 23 a length of I2in. had been attained, and the 
appearance shown in the photograph taken that day. The 
next photograph was secured June 13. The antlers were 
then about isin. long, with a spread of the tines on each 
of I4in. 
From this time to the latter part of July the growth 
was rapid, and when our third picture was taken, Aug. i, 
the antlers were complete and perfect, except as to the 
ends of the points. There were eight points ou one side 
and seven on the other. 
When these moose were brought here tlie bull was said 
to be six years old. His antlers had a spread of 47in. 
with eighteen points. Those shown by our photographs 
also had a spread of 47in., but the points had decreased 
as above stated, and the weight was also much less. Those 
who were interested hoped for an improved set, but evi- 
dently impaired vitality prevented a vigorous growth. 
As the antlers increased in size the bell also increased 
until 13 or I4in. long, and after the antlers were dropped. 
Dec. I the bell decreased in length. 
May 19 the cow gave birth to a female calf. The calf 
weighed about 3olbs., and was a light bay color. This 
gradually changed, the ends of the hairs first, to a brown 
like the parents. We secured a very good portrait of this 
young moose when twenty-four days old. For the pur- 
pose of taking these pictures we went several times into 
the paddock with the moose without their showing any 
ugly disposition, but in the fall the bull became danger- 
ous. These animals were confined in an enclosure about 
15ft, square, containing a grove of trees, but no bushes. 
For the want of bushes to rub, or from some other cause, 
our moose never entirely cleared the velvet from his 
antlers, nor did they attain the dark color natural to the 
antlers of the wild moose. 
The evening of Oct. i, 1897, having just returned from 
a moose calling trip to New Brunswick, I went to our 
park to try the effect of an imitation of the defiant note 
of the bull moose, as I had heard it in the wilds of the 
Mirimachi country. The family of moose were lying 
together in the grove of trees in their paddock, soft, or 
so from the fence; bright about us shone the electric 
lights, and nearby the passing of steam and electric cars, 
gave sounds not usually associated with moose calling.. 
At the first sound of the horn, the bull sprang to his feet, 
giving his answer and starting toward me, and the cow 
answered with a long call. I thought also the calf an- 
swered, but of this in the excitement and noise I could 
not be sure. At the second sound of the note, the bull, 
answered again, and without an instant's hesitation 
charged against the fence in the greatest fury. As he 
came on his head was lowered, bringing his antlers about 
on a line with his shoulders. 
At other times, both day and evening, I tried to deceive 
him, but without success. The cow would repeatedly 
answer, always with a short call, quite different from the 
long call imitated tO call the moose of the wild woods. A 
number of different notes, this cow used, usually in a tone 
that could be heard only a short distance. 
The life of these interesting animals here was short. 
The older moose both died in December, 1897, having 
lived here about a year, and the calf died in the spring of 
1898. The conditions under which they were kept were 
not favorable. They had no access to any body of water, 
and evidently suffered in the summer heat, nor had they 
sufficient room for exercise, Fred Talcott, 
Provjpence, R. J-t Feb. H. 
