THE RING-TAILED CAT (Bassariscus astutus and its relatives)

(For illustration, see page 562)

The mild climate and the proximity of the Southwestern States to Mexico and the tropics brings within our borders numerous strange types of wild life. Of these the ring-tailed cat is one of the most strikingly marked and interesting. In the United States it is known by several other names, including “civet cat,” “coon cat,” and “band-tailed cat.” In Mexico it still bears the old Aztec name cacomixtle, except in Lower California, where it is the “babisuri.” It is about the size of a large cat but with proportionately longer and slenderer body, shorter legs, and longer tail. The alternating bands of black and white on the tail proclaim its relationship, not to the cat, to which it has no kinship, but to the raccoon, which has a tail similarly marked. Few mammals possess such a beautifully formed head and face, and its large, mild eyes give it a vivid expression of intelligence.

The ring-tailed cat occupies areas under such differing climates as to produce geographic races, but none of them vary strikingly from the typical animal here illustrated. They range from Oregon, Nevada, southern Utah, Colorado, and Texas south to Costa Rica. In Mexico they occur from near sealevel up to an altitude of about 10,000 feet. While chiefly rock-inhabiting species, they sometimes live in the forests and as a rule make their dens in caves and deep crevices, but sometimes in hollow trees or about houses. Their young, from three to four in number, are born in May or June.

In the Southwest they frequent some of the ruined cliff dwellings, and I have found them haunting many of the ancient ruins of Mexico. Their presence in little caves and other sheltered spots along cliffs and rock walls bordering canyons or on mountain slopes may usually be known by an examination of the fine dust which accumulates in sheltered places. Whenever present their delicate cat-like tracks will be found where they have been hunting mice or other small game.

Strictly nocturnal, they do not sally forth from their dens until darkness is complete. During the night they are restless and frequently wander far and wide in search of food, and apparently at times merely to satisfy a spirit of inquiry. Their inquisitive nature frequently leads them to explore the streets of towns and cities on the Mexican table-land, filled though these places are with dogs. At daybreak, tracks left in the dusty streets tell the story of their wanderings, as they often do also in the case of opossums.

One morning in February, 1893, soon after sunrise, I chanced to pass through a little wooded square in the City of Mexico and saw a lot of boys pursue and capture one of these animals which, having overstayed his time, had been surprised by daybreak. This wanderer might have had its den in some house in the neighborhood, since one of its known habits is to take up its abode about houses, even in the midst of towns. A friend living in the City of Mexico informed me that after having been annoyed for some time by noises on the roof at night, he investigated and discovered a female cacomixtle with partly grown young snugly located in a nest placed in a narrow space between the tile roof and the ceiling. In southern Texas the animals live on the brush-grown plains under conditions very different from those usually chosen.

Like its relative the raccoon, the cacomixtle, with a taste for a varied fare, takes whatever edibles come its way. It stalks wood rats, mice, and even bats amid their rocky haunts and birds in bushes and low trees. About the southern end of the Mexican table-land it is much disliked for its robberies of chicken roosts, especially when these are located in trees. Insects of many kinds, larvæ, and centipedes are eaten, as well as a great variety of fruits, including that of the pear-leaved cactus, and dates, figs, and green corn.

Ring-tailed cats regularly locate among rocky ledges, neighboring orchards, or other cultivated areas where they may gather some of the bounty provided by man. I found them more plentiful among the broken lava cliffs bordering date palm orchards in Lower California than in any other place. When the dates were ripening they prowled about under the palms after dark with gray foxes and spotted skunks to pick up the fallen fruit. They sometimes uttered a complaining cry and when caught in a trap would bark almost like a little dog, or occasionally utter a vicious scream of mixed fear and rage.

Being an intelligent animal, the cacomixtle is readily tamed and makes a most interesting pet. During the early years of gold mining in California, when many men were living in rude cabins in the mountains, the prevalence of mice often attracted these “cats” to take up their residence there. Often the owner of the premises and the mouser struck up a friendly relationship and the cacomixtle, becoming as free and friendly about the place as a real cat, kept it entirely clear from mice. I have had first-hand accounts of these tame individuals from miners who had harbored them in this way for months. These accounts always gave the impression that the animal was somewhat playful and mischievous and most attractive to have about the premises. All agreed that it was extremely fond of sugar.

THE OREGON MOLE (Scapanus townsendi and its relatives)

(For illustration, see page 563)

The effect on mammals of a narrowly specialized mode of life is well illustrated in the mole. It is an expertly constructed living mechanism for tunneling through the earth. The pointed nose, short neck, compactly and powerfully built cylindrical body, with ribs strongly braced to withstand pressure, and the short, paddlelike hands armed with strong claws for digging are all fitted for a single purpose. Eyes and ears are of little service in an underground life, so they have become practically obsolete; the fur has been modified to a compact velvety coat which will lie either front or back with equal facility and thus relieve any friction from the walls of the tunneled roads, no matter which way the animal travels.

Moles are circumpolar in distribution, being found from England to Japan in the Old World and on both the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of the New World, where they occur only in North America. On this continent they are limited mainly to the United States and southern Canada, extending across the Mexican border only in two limited areas at the extreme east and west. Their distribution is not continuous across the continent, but is broken by a broad unoccupied belt formed by the arid interior, including the Great Basin. The home of the Oregon mole lies in the humid area west of the Cascade Mountains in Washington, Oregon, and extreme northwestern California. Closely related forms range from eastern Oregon southward through California to the San Pedro Martir Mountains in Lower California, and others north into British Columbia.

The Oregon mole is the largest and handsomest member of the group in America and perhaps in the world. Its skin, a velvety coat of nearly black fur, often with a purplish sheen, now brings a higher price in the market than that of any other species. Its size and the beauty of its dark coat distinguish it from any other mole.

Where the soil is loose the mole practically swims through it, urged forward by powerful impulses of its “hands” and feet. This is the common mode of travel near the top of the ground, where the course is marked by the lightly upheaved and broken surface. When working at a greater depth and in more compact soil the mole must dig its way and dispose of the loose earth by pushing it along the tunnel to an outlet at the surface through which it is thrust to form a mound similar to the “dumps” of that other great miner, the pocket gopher.

On account of this similarity in mode of life, moles and pocket gophers are sometimes confused by persons not familiar with the two animals. The resemblance ends in this apparent likeness, for the pocket gophers belong to the great order Rodentia, or gnawing animals, while the moles are of the Insectivora, or insect-eaters.

The superbly forested region inhabited by Oregon moles is so well watered that few places, even on high mountain slopes, are too dry for them to occupy. These animals are generally distributed, and their hills may be seen in the midst of the great coniferous forests as well as in the open valleys.

They are most abundant in open grassy areas, especially in meadows and in the bottoms of canyons and similar places, where the damp rich soil affords a plentiful supply of earthworms, grubs, and insects on which to feed. Like other moles, they lead lives of great activity and almost constant hard labor. During damp weather they work near the surface, but in dry periods as the upper soil hardens they follow their prey to lower levels. A hard shower, however, always brings an outburst of activity as they reoccupy the upper soil and throw up a multitude of new mounds. They have the habit of regularly coming to the surface to hunt food during the night. This is no doubt coincident with the swarming up to the surface of earthworms on which the moles feed. At such times many are captured by owls, cats, and other beasts of prey.

The runways of moles close along the surface, shown by well-marked ridges, are for hunting purposes, and the lower tunnels, from which the earth in the mounds is brought, are for traveling and lead to the nest chamber. The deep tunnels of the Oregon mole sometimes extend considerable distances along fences, or other surface cover, which afford more or less protection. Such tunnels are a kind of highway often used by several moles and also by shrews and field mice. The system of tunnels of the moles over a considerable area often intersect and are used more or less in common. As a result more than twenty moles have been trapped at a single point in one of these underground roads.

They make an intricate system of many-branched tunnels, the courses of which are usually marked by series of mounds varying from four to ten inches high and five to twenty inches wide and often scattered over meadows or other fields from two to six feet apart. Owing to the persistence with which the moles raise their mounds everywhere in the occupied parts of their territory, they have become a serious and costly pest. In meadows the knives of mowing machines are dulled by them, and in towns lawns are disfigured by their undesirable activities. As a consequence they have now fallen under the ban and are classed with other mammals which have shown their lack of ability to fit in satisfactorily with the changed conditions brought to their ancient territory by civilized man. Under natural conditions their activities were undoubtedly entirely beneficial.

They appear to have but a single litter of young, numbering from one to four, each year. These are born in March and grow so rapidly that by the last of May they are working in the tunnels and are scarcely distinguishable from the adults.

The recent discovery that the Oregon moleskin is valuable for its fur will give such an incentive to trapping that there is little doubt the boys of the State within a few years will reduce the numbers of the animal and thus control its injury to agriculture. The market for the skins appears practically unlimited, judging by trade reports, one dealer in Brooklyn stating that he dressed 4,000,000 imported European moleskins in 1916.

THE STAR-NOSED MOLE (Condylura cristata)

(For illustration, see page 563 )

The star-nosed mole, known in parts of Maine as the “gopher,” is peculiar among the moles in having a fringe around the end of its nose formed by twenty-two short fleshy tentacles. A less-marked character is in the proportionately long tail, which becomes greatly enlarged in fall and remains in this condition during the winter months. Otherwise the external appearance of this species is much like that of the common moles of America and the Old World.

The star-nosed mole is found from southern Labrador, the southern end of Hudson Bay, and southeastern Manitoba south along the Atlantic coast to Georgia and in the interior down the Alleghenies to North Carolina and to Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. Throughout this area it ranges irregularly and much yet remains to be learned about the details of its distribution and habits.

Ordinarily solitary, these moles at times are so numerous in limited areas that they appear to form colonies. Such gatherings probably mean an unusually rich feeding ground, which makes it unnecessary for the young to disperse to outlying locations, as is the habit of moles and most other mammals.

The star-nosed mole has a strong preference for damp and even marshy or swampy locations. It frequents low-lying meadows, the borders of streams, and grassy swamps, where its underground burrows alternate with open surface runways among grass roots and other matted vegetation. It spends far more time above ground than the other moles, and not infrequently swims among flooded cat-tails and other vegetation and in winter has been seen swimming under the ice.

Like others of its kind, this mole is amazingly powerful in proportion to its size. It persistently adds to its surface ridges, and in constantly extending its deeper tunnels must dig loose earth and dispose of it by forcing it up through an outlet to form the mounds which mark the course of its travels. Where the soil is loose it readily forces it aside with its compact body and paddle-shaped hands. In pushing up the little piles of earth and in the ridges raised when burrowing close to the surface it sometimes injures meadows and other cultivated land. Occasionally it wanders away from the fields and invades lawns and gardens, where the only injury it does is in the disturbance of the soil.

Its nests are compact little balls of fine grass, weeds, or leaves in dry underground chambers excavated in its burrows. The nests are a foot or two underground, but above the level of the water, sometimes under a stump and again in a knoll or bank. One nest containing five young was found in Maryland in an old woodshed under several inches of chips. This location and its choice of a site for its nest under a stump in a field or in a dry knoll are clear indications of a kind of intelligence which even the lowliest animals appear to have in caring for their young.

The star-nosed mole is full of the restless energy so necessary in a mammal which must come across its food by more or less haphazard tunneling through the soil. It is active both summer and winter. In dry weather as the moisture near the surface decreases the soil hardens and earthworms and other subterranean life seek deeper levels. The mole follows them, only to return with them nearer the surface with a renewal of the moisture. In winter it sometimes comes out and travels slowly about on top of the snow, ready to burrow out of sight at once, however, at the sound of approaching footsteps.

The food of the star-nose, like that of most other moles, is made up mainly of earthworms, white grubs, cutworms, wireworms, and other underground insects. In captivity, before eating a worm or other flesh food offered, it first feels of it with the little raylike organs of touch on its nose. It is difficult to surmise the real value of these “feelers,” for it would seem that the acute sense of smell so common to mammals should do better service.

Aside from its disturbance of the surface soil by its ridges and mounds, the star-nosed mole does no direct injury, and its life is largely passed in the useful task of searching out and destroying insects. Indirectly it causes some injury to root crops, plants of various kinds, and fruit trees, by providing tunnels along which meadow and pine mice travel to commit the ravages which on circumstantial evidence are charged to the mole.

THE COMMON SHREW (Sorex personatus and its relatives)

(For illustration, see page 566)

Many interesting small mammals are nocturnal or lead such obscure and hidden lives that they are rarely observed except by naturalists. Of these are the numerous species of shrews, which include the smallest mammals in the world. These tiny beasts all live among the vegetation and debris on the surface of the ground or in little burrows below. With the moles they are members of the order Insectivora and depend mainly on insects and meat for food. Despite their minute size, they are possessed of an indomitable courage and ferocity, which leads them without hesitation to attack and kill mice many times their own weight.

The genus Sorex, of which the common shrew is a member, is circumpolar in distribution, the various species ranging through England, the European mainland, Asia, and North America as far south as Guatemala.

The common shrew is a purely North American animal, occupying all the northern part of the continent from the Arctic shores of Alaska and Canada south to northern Nevada, South Dakota, Illinois, and Pennsylvania, and along the Allegheny and high Rocky Mountains to North Carolina and New Mexico. Its vertical range extends from the seacoast up to timberline in the Rocky Mountains.

The common shrew is the smallest of the mammals in all the northern parts of this continent, and one marvels at the possibility of such a tiny morsel of flesh and blood withstanding the rigors of the arctic winters. It measures about four inches in total length and weighs about forty-five grains; the body and tail are slender, the nose long and sharp, and the rim of the ears shows a little above the dense velvety fur. By these characters it may be distinguished from the larger, more heavily proportioned (and darker-colored) short-tailed shrews which abound with it in certain parts of its range. Its smaller size and grayish brown color are the main superficial differences between it and other American members of the same genus. The climatic differences in its wide range have developed several geographic races, none of which, however, show strongly marked characters.

This shrew appears to have a most catholic taste, so far as its surroundings are concerned, for it appears to frequent every type of situation where shelter and food can be found. It abounds among the peat beds and sphagnum mosses of the desolate barrens bordering on the Arctic coast, as well as amid the rotten stumps, old logs, fallen leaves, and other vegetable debris on the floor of the forests farther south. It will be found also in the rank matted vegetation about marshes, in old fields and occasional sphagnum swamps in the southern parts of its range.

The little tunneled runways of these shrews form a network in the beds of moss in a sphagnum swamp near Washington. In the forest the animals always seek the cover afforded by fallen logs, slabs of bark, or anything else that will give protection. On the coast of New Jersey they live so near the sea that an extra high tide forces them to mount the drift logs on the salt meadows for safety. They often make little burrows in the soft earth under the roots of a tree, a stump, or a log.

Their nests are small balls of dry leaves, grasses, or other soft vegetable material placed snugly under a log or in a hollow stump, burrow, or other good retreat, where they appear to have two or more litters of from six to ten young during the summer and fall.

As in the other shrews, the food of the common species consists mainly of insects, larvæ, worms, and obtainable flesh; but in winter and possibly at other seasons many kinds of food are eaten, including insects, meat, fat, flour, and seeds. During the years I passed at St. Michael, on the coast of Bering Sea, the beginning of winter always brought into the storehouses and dwellings a swarm of field mice, lemmings, and these shrews. The food requirements of all appeared to be the same, and all fed freely on the flour and other accessible stores. Dozen of the shrews were killed in the houses every winter.

Occasionally I caught and kept one captive for a time to observe its habits. It would be extremely restless and equally active by day or night. The small eyes appeared of little service, but the long, flexible snout was used constantly and served as the main reliance of the little beast for information as to the outside world.

Wherever they travel these shrews utilize the runways of the field mice or other small animals and make little runs of their own only where necessary. Aside from a faint squeak, I have never heard them utter a sound, but other observers credit them with series of fine twittering notes apparently uttered as a song.

The common shrew is a solitary animal of so morose a disposition that if two are placed in a cage together they almost immediately fall upon one another with tooth and nail, and the victor devours the body of its companion at a single meal. The digestion of shrews is so rapid and the call for food so incessant that it requires constant activity to keep the demand satisfied.

After the winter snow arrived in the North I found many tunnels of these shrews running just under its surface and raising it a little in a slight but distinctly rounded ridge. Such tunnels wandered widely and on the ice of the Yukon River I traced one of them more than a mile and repeatedly saw them crossing the river from bank to bank. It was surprising to note the ability of the little travelers under the surface to keep in so nearly a direct line for long distances.

At times these little adventurers make similar tunnels in the snow far out on the sea ice. The mythology of the Eskimos contains accounts of many supernatural animals which a lone hunter may meet and which have the power to do him deadly harm. Among these the “sea shrew” is one of the most malignant. Its appearance is described as exactly like that of the common land shrew, but it is said to live on the ice at sea, and if it sees a hunter to dart at him through the air, pierce the skin, and, after running all through the body with incredible rapidity, to enter the man’s heart and kill him. In consequence of this belief the Eskimo hunters were in mortal terror if they chanced to encounter a stray shrew on the sea ice. I knew one hunter who suddenly meeting one on the ice stood motionless for hours until the shrew wandered out of sight. He then hastened home and all the other hunters agreed he had had a lucky escape.

THE SHORT-TAILED SHREW (Blarina brevicauda and its relatives)

(For illustration, see page 566)

Several groups of species or genera of the little mouselike animals known as shrews are peculiar to North America. Of these one of the most numerous and best known is the short-tailed shrew. It is a dark-colored animal much more heavily proportioned, larger, and with a shorter tail than the common shrew. Its fur is so thick and velvety that it is confused by many people with the mole, despite its smaller size.

The short-tailed shrews, sometimes called mole shrews, of the genus Blarina belong to a single species with several geographic races occupying eastern Canada and the United States, from Nova Scotia, southern Quebec, Ontario, Minnesota, and North Dakota southward to Florida and the Gulf coast as far as eastern Texas. Vertically they range from sea-level up to the tops of the Alleghenies. Another group of American shrews, containing numerous species belonging to the genus Cryptotis, occupies the mountains of the Western States, and ranges south to northern South America. In external form it is indistinguishable from the short-tailed species.

Probably no mammal is more numerous in the eastern United States than the short-tailed shrew. It occurs everywhere—in forests, in brushy areas, in old fields, and along grassy banks. Within the city of Washington it is common in Rock Creek Park, where it lives in covered runs which it makes among the grass and fallen leaves. These shrews drink frequently, and this may in part account for their abundance near streams or other water, although it may be the desirable moist soil conditions which draw them to such situations.

The runways of these shrews are scarcely half an inch wide, usually partly sunken in the mold or rotting surface vegetation. These are not made by digging, but by pushing aside the loose mold, and they cross and re-cross in an irregular network. They lead to the entrances to burrows which generally drop nearly straight down. The burrows are sometimes amid the leaves, but usually under the shelter of a root, stump, old log, or other cover. In addition to their own runways, the shrews make free use of the runs of meadow mice and even traverse the tunnels of the pine mice and moles in their restless search for prey.

Small rounded chambers opening off their underground runways are filled with fine grass, pieces of leaves, and other soft matter for a nest. One nest examined was made entirely from the hair of meadow mice, probably the spoils of war from the bodies of victims. As a rule, shrews are extremely unsocial, but a pair of this species is sometimes found occupying the same nest, no doubt a temporary arrangement. Several litters, containing from four to six each, appear to be born through the summer and fall, usually beginning in June.

While equally active by day and by night, the eyes of these shrews seem to be of little use except to distinguish between light and dark, but their senses of hearing and smell are highly developed, as is also the sense of touch in their long hairs, or “whiskers,” about the nose. In captivity an extreme sensitiveness is exhibited to sudden sounds, especially such as those of a bird’s wings, indicating an instinctive fear born of age-long persecution by birds of prey. Food is located by smell, and as the flexible end of the snout is moved continually from side to side, odors are caught which may register conceptions as definite in the minds of these small animals as sight does in more favored beasts. All shrews are provided with musk glands and on account of these are apparently nauseous to most other animals, as they are rarely eaten by beasts of prey. These musky secretions must be of great service to facilitate them in locating one another.

Like other shrews and the moles, their digestion appears to be very rapid and they will eat two or three times their own weight in a day. This necessitates great activity on their part during much of the time in order to find the required food. They prefer insects and meat, but are practically omnivorous, feeding not only upon many kinds of insects, but on earthworms, slow-worms, sow-bugs, snails, slugs, mice, shrews, and the young of ground-nesting birds, as well as such vegetable food as beechnuts, seeds, bread, and oatmeal.

The instinct of prevision against the season of winter scarcity appears to be developed in them, as one in captivity buried beechnuts in the earth, and they are known to store living snails in small piles and to gather disabled beetles in store-rooms in their tunnels.

The courage and blind ferocity of the short-tailed shrews when they are placed near captive mice far larger than themselves, is amazing to all who witness their encounters. They attack instantly, spreading their front feet to gain a firmer footing and moving forward in little rushes. Mice larger and much more powerful than the shrew are persistently attacked and, finally giving out, are pounced upon and the flesh torn from their heads and necks with ravening eagerness. One day a passing observer heard a loud squealing on a railroad bank where an examination revealed a short-tailed shrew dragging away a nearly dead pine mouse, though the mouse was much the heavier. The notes of shrews are a fine tremulous squeak which becomes a longer, harsher, and more twittering or chattering cry when they are angry.

No cessation of their activity occurs in winter. When the cold weather begins many gather about barns and houses located near woods or old fields, and thus with the field mice take advantage of the garnered food supplies and shelter. Others remain in their regular haunts, where they frequently burrow long distances in the snow, making networks of tunnels and traveling long distances just below the surface, leaving little raised ridges like the track of a mole on the ground. Their journeys upon and under the surface of the snow appear to be in search of food, as they burrow down to old logs and stumps which make good feeding grounds. Their movements are very active, as they go about either at a walk or quick trot.

These fierce and truculent little hunters are wholly beneficial in their habits and should be encouraged in place of being killed on sight indiscriminately, as one of the ordinary mouse tribe.

THE RED BAT (Nycteris borealis)

(For illustration, see page 566)

Bats reach their greatest development in the tropics, where a marvelous variety of these curious mammals exist. To the northward the number of species gradually decreases, until eventually, in northern Canada and Alaska, a single species represents the group. The United States, occupying the middle latitudes, has a considerable number of different kinds. Some of these remain throughout the year, hibernating in caves during the period of cold, when insects are not to be had; others wing their way southward like birds on the approach of winter and return in spring.

All bats are nocturnal, although individuals of some species occasionally fly about for a time by day and many come out just before or soon after sunset. In this country practically all species are insectivorous, but in Mexico and the West Indies many are fruit-eaters and a few true vampires or blood-suckers.

As a rule, bats are clothed in dull colors, but richly tinted coats give a few a more attractive appearance. Of these none has a more striking adornment than that presented by the soft covering of glossy orange-red fur of the red bat. Its large size, about four inches in total length, with a spread of wings amounting to twelve inches, combined with its color, suffices to distinguish it at once from any other northern species.

The range of the red bat extends from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific and from Ontario and Alberta in southern Canada south throughout most of the United States to the Gulf coast and southern California; also beyond our limits to Lower California and Costa Rica. The genus to which this bat belongs ranges more widely in other parts of North America; also to South America and across the eastern Pacific to the Galapagos and Hawaiian Islands.

The red bat rarely or never seeks shelter in gloomy caves and crevices, but hangs to the small twigs or leaf stems on trees and bushes in the full light of the sun. One observer in Texas on July 4 found four of them hanging in a cluster from a twig on a peach tree, with the sun shining full on them, although the temperature in the shade was 82 degrees Fahrenheit. I have found them in northern Illinois in the glaring sunlight of May, hanging from leaves in the tops of oak trees. This unusual tolerance of light in a member of the bat tribe is further shown by its habit of beginning to hunt through the air for insects earlier in the afternoon than other species in its range.

Long, narrow wings and swift, powerful flight characterize the red bats in the air. They have marvelous control in darting and turning here and there, and no birds, except possibly the chimney swifts, can equal them in their extraordinary gyrations.

Red bats are known to migrate from the northern part of their range in September or October and to return in May. They have been seen going south at Cape Cod the last of August and in September; and late in October Dr. E. A. Mearns has recorded great flights of them down the Hudson Valley, lasting throughout the day. That they share the vicissitudes of migrating birds is indicated by observation on the New Jersey coast of stray individuals coming in from the sea exhausted early on September mornings.

They are among the most solitary of their kind, usually being found hanging singly on a tree or bush, sometimes within a few feet of the ground. On occasion they gather in clusters as mentioned above, and in one instance in Maryland more than a dozen were hanging in a compact ball, which suddenly exploded into its winged parts when disturbed.

One of the most unusual characteristics of the red bat is found in the number of young it bears. Usually other species, except the hoary bat, have one or two young, but at varying dates between May and July each year the red bat produces from two to four, the average being three or four. The young when very small are carried clinging to the body of the mother in her flights. She continues to take them from place to place in this manner until their combined weight exceeds her own. The strength of the maternal feeling in this species is well illustrated by an instance in Philadelphia where a boy caught a half-grown red bat in a city square and carried it home. In the evening, three hours later, he crossed the same square, carrying the young bat in his hand, when the old one came circling about him and finally in her deep anxiety alighted on his breast. Both were brought in, the young one clinging to its mother’s teat. The devoted mother received injuries when she was captured, from which she died two days later.

In the contact between mankind and bats, man, the invariable aggressor, finds the bats baring their teeth, biting viciously, squeaking, and behaving altogether like little fiends. A gentler side is sometimes exhibited, however, and one observer who caught a partly grown red bat found that it became tame, showed intelligence, and developed a friendly feeling for its captor.

THE HOARY BAT (Nycteris cinereus)

The hoary bat is a close relative of the red bat described above, but is larger, about five inches long, and, as its name implies, is of a different color. It is widely distributed over a large part of North America, where it is known to breed from Nova Scotia, Manitoba, and the southern shore of Great Slave Lake south practically throughout the United States. It is one of our larger species and is remarkable for its power and skill on the wing. The wings are long and narrow and carry their owner through the air in a bewildering series of swoops, curves, and zigzag turns remarkable even in a group of animals so notable for their powers of flight.

With the approach of cold weather the hoary bat migrates from the northern parts of its range to the milder southern districts. It is a late migrant, not leaving its northern home until the last of September or October and returning in May. Some individuals appear to remain in the North all winter, as one has been taken in Connecticut in December. In its southern flight it wanders as far as Jalisco, near the southern end of the Mexican table-land, to Lower California, and to the Bermuda Islands. To reach the Bermudas it is evident the bat must make a continuous flight from the nearest point on our shores of at least 580 miles—a good tribute to its wing power.

Like the red bat, it lives in the open, hanging from twigs and leaves in the tops of trees or bushes in the broad light of day rather than in the dark, stifling crevices where so many of its kind pass their lives. It appears to hang up indifferently on any convenient tree or bush, including conifers, aspens, or willows. During the day it has a curious lack of alertness, and as it is not rarely attached to low branches or bushes within a few feet of the ground it may be readily approached and taken in the hand. I once captured a fine specimen the middle of May, in southern California, hanging on a bush about four feet from the ground. It appeared to be sound asleep until taken by the skin on the back of the neck, when it became very much alive and, struggling in a fury, uttered grating shrieks of rage, baring its sharp, white teeth and trying desperately to bite.

Its food is made up entirely of insects, which it appears to hunt higher up than most bats, sweeping over the tops of the forest and in and out about the trees. It appears to be of even more solitary habits than the red bat and is nowhere so common. Another reason for our lack of information concerning it is found in its strictly nocturnal habits, for it rarely appears until shortly before the approaching night hides it from view.

The hoary bat shares with the red species the distinction of bearing from two to four young each year. The young are born in June and are carried attached to the underside of the mother’s body until they become too heavy a burden. They hang to the teats with the greatest tenacity and apparently rely mainly on this hold to prevent being dropped as they are carried on the wild aërial hunting excursions. With the unusual fecundity indicated by the number of young, it is difficult to account for the scarcity of these bats unless their habit of hanging in the open, exposed to the elements and to other dangers, may cause a heavy mortality among them.

Note.—The attention of the reader is called to an error on page 566, where the Little Brown Bat, Myotis lucifugus, on the tree trunk, a common species throughout most of North America, is labeled “Hoary Bat, Nycteris cinereus,” which is a much larger and very different animal.

THE MEXICAN BAT (Nyctinomus mexicanus and its subspecies)

(For illustration, see page 567)

Reference has been made in several preceding sketches of this series to the mammals of tropical origin which have invaded our southern border. The Mexican bat is a notable member of this class. It differs in many curious ways from the bats with which it associates in temperate regions. It is smaller than any of the other three bats treated here and is strongly characterized by a flattening of the head and body which enables it to creep into a surprisingly narrow crevice in the rocks or elsewhere. The ears are broad and flaring and extend forward over the eyes like the visor of a cap, and the end of the tail is not confined within the membrane extending between the hind legs, but projects from it. Another pronounced characteristic of this bat and one highly disagreeable is the rank musky odor which it gives out. This pollutes the air about its harboring places, rendering it a most unwelcome guest.

Whoever has visited the Southern and Southwestern States or Mexico must have noted the offensive odor in many places about the verandas of houses and especially about old churches and other public buildings. This is the sign of occupancy placed on the premises by the Mexican bats, which, to the number of a few dozens or actually by thousands, as conditions permit, may lie snugly hidden in cracks and dark openings of all kinds about the roof and walls. No other bat in Mexico or the United States is provided with so strong an odor.