32 
FOREST AND STREAM 
JANUARY, 1920 
with my twelve, which is sufficient an- 
swer to me. When I first bought this 
gun I had not entirely divorced my mind 
from the thought that I needed plenty 
of powder and shot, with the result that 
I attempted to overload it. I soon found, 
however, that 2% drams powder and % 
oz. shot was the proper load for this 
particular gun. 
Now, I am not prescribing any par- 
ticular length of barrel or gauge for 
anyone, any more than a certain drop 
in stock, for we all need something dif- 
ferent, so let them shoot what pleases 
them, but the arguments of the big bore 
and long barreled cranks put me in 
mind of a backwood’s friend in Illinois 
years ago who was willing to stake his 
good right arm that his old muzzle 
loader would outshoot any new fangled 
gun ever made. One day while in the 
woods nearby I heard a series of shots 
similar to the Presidential salute fired 
by the warships in Seattle harbor re- 
cently, except that they were longer 
drawn out, the interval representing the 
time it took my friend to reload. Going 
over to see what the matter was I found 
him with a squirrel treed in a tall 
tree. Seeing his head in a fork of the 
tree I quickly raised my gun and down 
he came like a chunk of lead. Looking 
around my friend inquired, “What kind 
of a rifle is that, anyway?” 
W. H. James, Washington. 
A MOUNTAIN SHEEP HABITAT 
GROUP 
To the Editor of Forest and Stream : 
R ECENTLY (in 1916) the California 
Academy of Sciences completed, at 
a cost of about $200,000, the first unit of 
its new museum building in Golden 
Gate Park, San Francisco. In the unit 
completed is a hall 180 feet long by 60 
feet wide which is devoted wholly to 
fiabitat groups of California mammals, 
and there is another similar hall devoted 
-to California birds. These halls are 
unique in museum construction in that 
there are no windows, all the lighting 
being by means of skylights. The ex- 
hibits are in large cases built along the 
walls, 25 feet long, 13 feet deep (from 
front to back) and 18 feet to the ceiling 
glass. Over the groups are skylights 
which let in more light than do those 
over the observers, with the result that 
annoying reflection is almost entirely 
done away with. In most museums there 
are windows on one or more sides of the 
exhibition rooms, which result in such 
bad reflection that the visitor often sees 
himself and the animals of various other 
cases as plainly as he sees the exhibits 
he is looking at; all of which is very 
confusing. In the Academy museum 
provision is made for artificially lighting 
the exhibits at night and on dark days. 
Each large group has a plate glass 
front 15 feet long by 10 feet high. 
At the panels between the large 
groups there is room for 5-foot groups 
of smaller species such as chipmunks, 
etc. 
The Academy has completed the in- 
stallation of 19 large grbups and 10 
small ones. Among the large groups are 
the following: California Valley Elk, 
Black-tail Deer, Mule Deer, Antelope, 
Desert Mountain Sheep, Mountain Lion, 
Black Bear, Alaska Fur Seal, Leopard 
Seal, California Sea Lion, Steller’s Sea 
Lion, Coyote, Farallon Islands Sea Bird 
Rookery, Los Banos Water Bird group, 
Desert Bird group, White Pelican, Cali- 
fornia Condor, and San Joaquin Valley 
Duck and Goose group. Several others 
are under way, the most important of 
which is one of the Roosevelt Elk, that 
magnificent big game animal whose home 
is in the Olympic Mountains west of 
Puget Sound and south to the north- 
western counties of California. To meet 
the expense of installing the Roosevelt 
Elk group Captain William C. Van Ant- 
werp, a well-known public spirited gen- 
tleman, late of New York, now of San 
Francisco, has given the Museum $5,000. 
Some idea- of the beauty and scientific 
and educational value of these groups, 
can be gained from the accompanying 
illustration made from a photograph of 
the Desert Mountain Sheep group below. 
This species of mountain sheep or big- 
horn is found in the desert mountains 
of southern California and adjacent 
parts of Nevada, Arizona and Mexico. 
The animals in this group were taken 
in December, 1913, in the San Jacinto 
Mountains, Riverside County, California. 
The slender horns of the females have 
given rise to the mistaken belief that 
the Ibex — an animal found only in Eu- 
rope and Asia — is found in America. 
The story that mountain sheep some- 
times jump from high precipices and 
alight on their horns is entirely errone- 
ous, and is on a par with the hoopsnake, 
sea serpent and other similar stories. . 
In the desert mountains, water is 
usually scarce, and the mountain sheep 
frequently eat the barrel cactus, the 
pulpy interior of which contains a large 
percentage of water; and this no doubt 
enables the sheep to go for long periods 
without drinking. 
Barton Warren Evermann, 
California. 
A SNAKE THATi IMITATES 
THE RATTLER 
To the Editor of Forest and Stream: 
O N a warm afternoon in early Sep- 
tember we were tramping over a 
field where the wheat had been harvested 
when we came upon a fine large speci- 
men of the bull snake, a snake which re- 
sembles the rattle-snake in the mark- 
ings on the body, but which, unlike the 
rattle-snake, has a slender, pointed tail, 
a non-poisonous head, and often attains 
a length of more than six feet. 
We had heard, many times, that the 
bull snake will, when angry, imitate the 
alarm of the rattler, which in the in- 
stance of the rattler is made by a muscu- 
lar movement of the tail, causing the 
rattles to send forth a sound resembling 
the smothered whirr of an alarm clock. 
We were eager to see how a serpent with- 
out any rattler could “rattle.” 
A member of the party picked the 
snake up on the end of a long stick he 
was carrying and tossed him a few feet 
out into the stubble, then set the dog on 
him. 
The dog jumped about in front of the 
snake, barking loudly and becoming 
more and more excited as the snake 
began coiling and writhing in exact imi- 
tation of the movements of a rattle- 
snake on the war path. Then he began 
a most remarkable vocal performance. 
At first it was merely an indignant 
hissing and blowing; but as he was ex- 
cited to further protestations of dis- 
pleasure and anger the sound grew in 
volume and changed in character until 
it became a wonderful reproduction of 
the whirring, rasping alarm of the rat- 
tle-snake. The bull-snake was now> so 
enraged, although the dog had done 
nothing but bark and jump at him, that 
the sound he emitted became louder and 
shriller, resembling the clicking buzz of 
a locust and could be heard for several 
yards. We called off the dog then, well 
satisfied that a bull-snake can “rattle” 
as well as a rattle-snake himself. 
J. I. Carpenter, Colorado. 
