GENERAL NOTES 
53 
THE GRIZZLY BEAR AS A TREE-CLIMBER 
We are all, of course, familiar with the ever recurring statement that the full 
grown grizzly does not climb, and William T. Hornaday in his American Natural 
History claims that this species, in contrast to the agile black bear, cannot 
climb trees. 
At the present time there is confined in the Philadelphia Zoological Gardens, 
a fully matured grizzly {Ursus horribilis) which, whenever occasion arises, both 
climbs and descends the tree in the center of his den with far greater speed and 
ease than any black bear ever exhibited, and I have personally observed other 
grizzlies confined in the same dens demonstrate similar climbing ability. 
Is it not, therefore, reasonable to suppose that grizzlies have the ability to 
climb, but that their habits of life are such that, under normal conditions, climb- 
ing would never be a useful trait to develop? — A rthur H. Fisher, Washington, 
D. C. 
WOLVERENE IN ITASCA COUNTY, MINNESOTA 
In a recent paper on the mammals of Itasca County, Minnesota, there appears 
no record of the wolverene {Gulo luscus) for the region. (Cahn, A. R., Journ. 
Mamm., vol. 2, pp. 68-74, May, 1921.) Through the kindness of Dr. H. V. Ogden, 
of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, there has been for several years an almost perfect 
skull of an adult male wolverene from Minnesota in the possession of the Bio- 
logical Survey. The animal was killed in section 7, T 61 N, R 25 W, Itasca 
County, January 11, 1899. The specimen is number 110,281, United States Na- 
tional Museum, Biological Survey Collection. — Hartley H. T. Jackson, U. S. 
Biological Survey, Washington, D. C. 
MORE ACROBATIC SKUNKS 
During 1912 I published in Country Life an account of my skunk farm. A 
paragraph was devoted to the skunk “Johnny Jumpup” who had the curious 
trick of standing on his front feet with hind feet up in the air. Commenting on 
this in a letter, Mr. J. S. Duss, Jr., of New Smyrna, Florida, wrote to me at the 
time that “civet cats” were quite numerous around his house on the peninsula 
opposite the town. They were very tame and it was almost the rule for them 
to do the “very stunt which Johnny does.” He had seen “several at one time 
about the back porch doing the act.” — Ernest Thompson Seton, Greenwich, 
Conn. 
RED SQUIRRELS SWIMMING A LAKE 
On September 18, 1921, I visited White Sand Lake, Vilas County, Wisconsin, 
on a fishing trip. Whije my companion and I were arranging for a boat he noticed 
a small animal swimming some distance out from the shore and asked what it 
was. I ventured the opinion it might be a muskrat, but the boatman said no, 
it was a red squirrel, and that they had been crossing the lake to this (the south) 
shore from a point on the north shore for some days past. Sometimes as many 
as four or five were seen to cross in one day, according to his statement. I was 
somewhat incredulous as I had never seen a squirrel take voluntarily to the water. 
His assertion in this case was soon verified, however, for the little animal came 
almost directly toward us and landed scarcely twenty feet from where we were 
standing. It didn’t hesitate a moment as it reached the land but quickly crossed 
