506 APPENDIX E 
never any difficulty in seeing them; the difficulty is to prevent their see¬ 
ing the hunter. 
Mr. Thayer’s thesis is “that all patterns and colors whatsoever of 
all animals that ever prey or are preyed on are under certain normal 
circumstances obliterative.” Either this sentence is entirely incorrect 
or else it means nothing; either no possible scheme of coloration can 
be imagined which is not protective (in which case of course the whole 
theory becomes meaningless) or else the statement so sweepingly made is 
entirely incorrect. As I have already shown, there are great numbers 
of animals to which it cannot apply; and some of the very animals which 
do escape observation in complete fashion are colored utterly differently 
when compared one with the other, although their habitats are the same. 
The intricate pattern of the leopard and the uniform, simple pattern 
of the cougar seem equally efficient under precisely similar conditions; 
and so do all the intermediate patterns when the general tint is neutral; 
and even the strikingly colored melanistic forms of these creatures seem 
as well fed and successful as the others. Mono-colored cougars and 
spotted jaguars, black leopards and spotted leopards, and other cats of 
all tints and shades, broken or unbroken, are frequently found in the 
same forests, dwelling under precisely similar conditions, and all equally 
successful in eluding observation and in catching their prey. 
One of the most extreme, and most unwarrantable, of the positions 
taken by the ultra-advocates of the protective coloration theory is that 
in reference to certain boldly marked black and white animals, like 
skunks and Colobus monkeys, whose coloration patterns they assert to be 
obliterative. In skunks, the coloration is certainly not protective in any 
way against foes, as every human being must know if he has ever come 
across skunks by night or by day in the wilderness; their coloration 
advertises their presence to all other creatures which might prey on them. 
In all probability, moreover, it is not of the slightest use in helping them ob¬ 
tain the little beasts on which they themselves prey. Mr. Thayer’s “sky- 
pattern” theory about skunks cannot apply, for bears, which are equally 
good mousers and insect grubbers, have no white on them, nor have 
fishers, weasels, raccoons, or foxes; and in any event the “sky-pattern” 
would not as often obliterate the skunk from the view of its prey as it 
would advertise it to its prey. It is to the last degree unlikely that any 
mouse or insect is ever more easily caught because of the white “ sky- 
pattern” on the skunk; and it is absolutely certain that any of these 
