HOUSE AND GARDEN 
February, 1912 
33 
Others of the 
woods people are 
occupied more 
p e a c e a b 1 3^ All 
about are the 
tracks of the mice. 
The}' come up out 
of one hole in the 
snow and go down 
through another a 
few feet distant. 
They have nests 
down there in the 
ground, or in the 
hollow of a tree. 
The red squirrels 
are equally omni- 
present. Chip¬ 
munks have long 
since begun their 
hibernation, but the 
red squirrel is out 
in the coldest 
weather, bar¬ 
ring storms, run¬ 
ning about from tree to tree, intent upon his quest for food, and 
finding it often in the seeds of pine and spruce cones. The re¬ 
mains of his feasts are found in little, scattered clumps upon the 
snow. But the red squirrel is not limited to what he can find on 
the branches of the trees. He flirts his tail a few times, jabbers 
some insulting epithet — he first looks about to be sure that noth¬ 
ing is near to take offence — then disappears witli a dive into the 
snow. His reappearance may be instantaneous — that epithet is on 
his mind and someone may have heard—or it may be after half 
a minute and at a distance of a dozen feet. Wdien he comes up, 
he will eat his prize where he is or run with it to a nearb}' tree. 
When one first comes upon a hedgehog working, he is certain 
to think that he has found something. Mr. Hedgehog is a very 
portly gentleman. His legs are very short, and he has that well- 
developed middle which is guardedl}' termed a "corporation." 
In snow he is at a disadvantage. Nevertheless, he ploughs reso¬ 
lutely through it, leaving behind a broad, deep furrow, in the 
bottom of which are his footprints, almost like the diminutive 
impressions of a person’s hands. His paths run in all directions 
from his den, which is made under a ledge of rocks or in the base 
of a hollow tree. Wherever one strikes them, he will not have to 
follow far to headquarters, and turning the other way, he may 
often easily trace the Alderman himself to some tree which he is 
eating clean of bark. 
Of all interesting things in the winter woods, a deer yard is 
one of the most absorbing. Perhaps this is because it is on such 
a large scale and gives so much evidence of something go'ng on. 
When the snow is not too deep, the deer wander far afield, brows¬ 
ing on small twigs and scratching through the snow for forage. 
But when the snow piles higher and higher, giving no support 
for their delicate feet, and the cruel cold of January settles clown, 
the winter of their discontent begins. There is no real yard, as 
commonly believed, but the deer herd together in some protected 
locality, which becomes lined with their tracks. Their food is of 
the scantiest and they frequently starve or freeze. It is a pitiful 
story, this tragic tale of the deep snow, ending in well-worn fox 
tracks, which converge upon something beneath a thick spruce, 
where it last sought refuge from the searching cold. 
.•\fter the snows of late fall, some day when the mercury has 
suddenly tumbled down with ominous warning, vou ma}' run 
across the track of a bear on his house-hunting. All summer he 
{Continued on page 56) 
Old Alderman hedgehog may often be caught at his bark meal by 
following the furrow that he leaves 
The fat, slow hedgehog, plodding through the snow, leaves track 
enough to be made by a bear 
