854 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[June i, 1907. 
A Wolf in Pennsylvania. 
Altoona, Pa., May 22 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: The inclosed clipping from this morn¬ 
ing’s Times is substantially correct: 
“It is the general belief, especially among 
zoologists, that the native gray or timber wolf 
is extinct in Pennsylvania and has been so 
since the killing of one of these animals near 
Ligonier, Westmoreland county, in 1892, which 
was supposed to be the last of its kind in the 
State. Very surprising developments in this 
neighborhood within the last week have, how¬ 
ever, led to the conviction that this is a mis¬ 
taken idea, for, beyond the shadow of a doubt, 
a magnificent specimen of the native gray wolf 
(Lupus occidentals ) was killed within ten miles 
of Hollidaysburg on Monday of last week 
while in the act of devouring a lamb. _ 
“The well authenticated facts of this most 
surprising occurrence, as confirmed by in¬ 
terested persons, after careful investigation and 
complete examination of the animal, and in¬ 
terviews of the men who shot the same, are 
as follows, and can be guaranteed to be ab¬ 
solutely authentic: 
“Mr. James R. Moore, a prominent and re¬ 
spected farmer, occupies a farm in the ex¬ 
treme eastern end of Frankstown township, 
this county, ten miles from Hollidaysburg, on 
the western edge of a wild and very thickly 
wooded tract of land, known as the Beaver 
Dams, which extends for a distance of eight 
miles between Brush and Tussey mountains. 
Adjoining his farm and about five hundred 
yards distant, across Canoe Creek, a small 
stream flowing out of the Beaver Dam, is a 
farm occupied by Mr. S. C. Long, while ad¬ 
joining his farm and about one hundred yards 
from his house, lives Mr. Jacob Royer—all 
reliable and respected farmers. 
“Brush Mountain runs close behind these 
two farms, coming down almost to their or¬ 
chards, from which it is separated by a rather 
high ridge. For the last three years these 
three farmers, Moore, Royer and Long, have 
been losing numerous sheep, amounting in all 
to between forty and fifty. In most cases 
their dead bodies would be found in the morn¬ 
ing badly torn by some animal. These attacks 
were at first attributed to dogs, but about a 
year and a half or two years ago a mysterious 
animal was seen chasing them. It was at first 
taken for an unusually large gray fox, but hav¬ 
ing been seen several times recently at rather 
close range by these farmers, they began to 
doubt its being a fox at all, taking into con¬ 
sideration the ferocity it displayed on several 
occasions while chasing and attacking sheep, 
and at one time turning upon and putting to 
flight a hound set on it by Mr. Long. So 
they at last, most reluctantly came to the con¬ 
clusion that it was something far more savage 
than anything that had been seen in the neigh¬ 
borhood for many years, and the word ‘wolf’ 
began to be whispered among them, although 
it scarcely seemed possible. At last, after 
having attacked and killed three sheep in suc¬ 
cession within a month, the end of the savage 
came suddenly on last Monday, May 13. 
“At about 8 o’clock in the morning of that 
day the animal was discovered in the orchard 
adjoining Mr. Royer’s house, in the very act 
of throttling a young lamb. Mr. Royer ran 
out with a shotgun and fired a charge of small 
shot into the savage animal, causing it to drop 
its prey and start on a run for the mountain, 
close behind the orchard. At this point, Mr. 
Long, who had been attracted by the shot, 
had taken his position with an old muzzle¬ 
loading rifle, and as the animal passed him he 
shot it through the body, bringing it down, 
and a second shot soon terminated its career. 
Mr. Moore, also attracted by the shots, reached 
the scene in a few minutes, and assisted in 
skinning the animal. 
“While the appearance of this wolf in Penn¬ 
sylvania is indeed very mysterious, it may 
be possible that an old she wolf, a lone sur¬ 
vivor of the packs which used to roam our for¬ 
ests, may have littered on Tussey Mountain, 
which extends from Huntingdon county, 
through Blair, and that the so-called ‘prairie 
wolf’ just over the Bedford county line last 
year, may have been in reality a young gray 
wolf and one of her cubs, while the animal 
killed here last week may be either her mate 
or else a full grown cub of three or four years, 
of the male gray or timber wolf (Lupus occi- 
dentalis ) meeting in every detail the descrip¬ 
tion of that animal; head, ears, muzzle, paws, 
tail and hair—in fact, in every point. The 
hide measures five feet five inches in length 
from tip to tip, and the animal weighed in 
life, about sixty pounds, being very thin and 
gaunt, which probably explains his boldness. 
“Professor Clyde Todd, chief of the zoolog¬ 
ical department of Carnegie Institute, at Pitts¬ 
burg, was informed of the death of the animal 
and yesterday came on to inspect the remains. 
He pronounced it a thorough specimen of the 
gray or timber wolf, which have been believed 
to be extinct in this State for many years. 
Professor Todd purchased the hide, skeleton 
and skull of the animal, and shipped them to 
Pittsburg, where they will be mounted and 
placed on exhibition in Carnegie Institute. 
Professor Todd did not advance a theory as to 
where the animal came from, but takes kindly 
to the story that the wolf littered in Tussey 
Mountains, and that the wolf killed in Bedford 
countv last year was one of her cubs.” 
H. F. Coon. 
Birch Bark. 
Boston, May 18 .—Editor Forest and Stream: 
One of the loveliest of our trees is the white 
birch with its graceful foliage and gleaming- 
trunk; and yet how often it is robbed of half 
its beauty by careless hands! 
The temptation to take off strip after strip of 
its easily peeled bark seems well nigh irresistible 
if one may judge by the countless forlorn trunks 
along our roadsides. Instead of silvery, white 
columns standing out with conspicuous grace 
from the green of neighboring shrubs and trees, 
the trunks are marred by great black circles, the 
results of wounds inflicted by wanton passers-by. 
Too often this is done merely for the fun of 
seeing how easily the bark can be pulled off, and 
no thought is given to the feelings of the owner 
when he finds that one of his finest trees, in 
which he took great pride, has been robbed for¬ 
ever of its beauty. 
The next time you are tempted to cut off birch 
bark, stop. Think of the injury to the tree, and 
the injury to all who shall pass that way after 
you, in depriving them of something they might 
have enjoyed but for you, the sight of that tree 
in all its beauty. Remember that the bark never 
grows again. 
If you have in mind the making of some article 
for which birch bark is an absolute (?) neces¬ 
sity, can you not at least take it from some fallen 
log, or from some tree well hidden in the center 
of the woods, removing only the outer layers, 
and those in such a way that the tree will suffer 
as little as possible? By doing this you will 
earn the gratitude of all wayfarers and land 
owners. (Miss) M. E. Carter, 
Boston Society of Natural History. 
The Heads and Horns Collection. 
A part of the Administration building of the 
New York Zoological Society, now being erected 
in Bronx Park, New York city, will be devoted 
to the National Collection of Heads and Horns, 
an institution for whose success Director Wil¬ 
iam T. Hornaday has long been working in 
conjunction with members of the Boone and 
Crockett Club, the Lewis and Clark Club and 
the Campfire Club. Mr. Hornaday will give his 
own private collection of nearly 150 specimens 
as a starter, and without doubt a very large 
number of fine specimens will be donated as 
soon as the building is ready to house them tem¬ 
porarily. It is believed that once the collection 
becomes large it will be an easy matter to 
secure from the city an appropriation for a separ¬ 
ate building in which to display it properly. The 
collection is to become the property of the New 
York Zoological Society, but of course it will be 
preserved as a separate department. 
Carolus Linnaeus’ Birthday. 
A dispatch from Upsala, Sweden, dated May 
23, says the two hundredth anniversary of the 
birth of Carolus Linnaeus, the Swedish botanist 
and naturalist, was celebrated with imposing cere¬ 
monies at the University of Upsala on that day. 
The labors of Linnaeus are inseparably asso¬ 
ciated with this university. The Crown Prince, 
other members of the royal house, and a number 
of prominent Swedes, as well as delegates from 
many parts of the world, attended the cere¬ 
monies. 
In New York city the day was celebrated at 
the American Museum of Natural History, where 
Mr. J. A. Allen exhibited and explained much 
of the work done by Linnaeus in zoological and 
botanical research, and exercises commemorating 
the event were held by the New York Academy 
of Sciences. At the Botanical Gardens in Bronx 
Park Mr. P. A. Rydberg lectured on the great 
botanist’s work in America with special refer¬ 
ence to plants and flowers, many of which were 
on exhibition, and the bridge crossing the Bronx 
River was named in memory of Linnaeus. At 
the Aquarium in Battery Park the fishes and 
other forms of marine life he had studied were 
pointed out to- all visitors, and at the Brooklyn 
Institute addresses were delivered during the 
evening on Linnaeus’ work. 
A Cannibal Squirrel. 
Milford, N. S., May 18.— Editor Forest and 
Stream: A friend returning yesterday from an 
angling trip brought with him a interesting addi¬ 
tion to my menagery of pets in the shape of a 
nest of flying squirrels, mother and three little 
ones, very young. Now Sciuropterus volans is 
by no means common in this province and I am 
not intimately acquainted with its habits, but 
the actions of this extraordinary little mother 
have certainly shocked our “otherwise quiet com¬ 
munity.” One of the little ones was dead when 
we placed the nest in its destined box, and a 
second died during the evening. Corn and water 
were provided and the squirrel drank greedily 
and ate some corn. She then proceeded to eat 
the dead little one that had not yet been removed 
from the nest on the chance of its living, and 
devoured it nearly completely. Now, since hun¬ 
ger and thirst could not have been the cause of 
this cannibalism, was it undue excitement, sciur- 
opterian hysterics, as it were? I will add that 
during the night the remaining young one was 
transferred by the mother to the dark receptacle 
at the top of the cage which was placed there 
for this purpose, and eating and drinking seem 
to go on normally. Many animal mothers, I am 
aware, eat their young on occasion, but I did 
not suspect such customs of a squirrel. 
Edward Breck. 
Buffalo and Grouse, 
Aitkin, Minn., May 20. —Editor Forest and 
Stream: Recent communications in your paper 
in regard to the last buffalo killed in Nebraska 
suggest to me that while the one killed in the 
sandhills of the Dismal Hills in 1881 undoubtedly 
holds the record, I killed a buffalo in the sand¬ 
hills just west of the North Branch of Stinking 
Water, some forty miles south of Ogalalla in 
February, 1876. I also hunted in Dismal Hills in 
1873-4. That was eight years before the last 
buffalo was killed there, yet I saw no buffalo, the 
nearest approach being some very ancient trails. 
There were elk, deer and antelope in abundance 
but no buffalo. Those killed there in 1881 must 
have strayed down from the northern ranges 
where they existed at a much later date than 
in Nebraska. 
Not to drop too suddenly from ancient to 
modern history, yet changing the theme—as I 
was going along the road the other day, May 15, 
wading in about ten inches of snow—I saw in 
several places the trees dotted with prairie 
chickens and pinnated grouse. Though this is 
modern history, it carried me back beyond the 
buffalo days of my experience to when as a boy 
I used to see the prairie chickens flutter up into 
the trees thus to get out of the snow or frost 
of early morning. I had not expected to see 
such sights again, but I did. E. P. Jaques. 
