Page:The Scientific Monthly vol. 3.djvu/414

 4o8 THE SCIENTIFIC MONTHLY

In JTnly, 1801, BaTiiiundo GarriUo wrote from Monterey that the vaqueroe in that neighborhood had within the year killed thirty-eight bears, but that the depre- dations by others eontinned unabated; and he proposed an ambuscade by the troops at a certain place where the carcasses of a few old mares riiould be exposed.**

Newberry writing in 1857 EBserts concerning the grizzlies :

They are rather unpleasantly abundant in many parts of the Coast Bange, and Sierra Nevada, in California, where large numbers are annually killed by the hunters, and where not a few of the hunters are annually lolled by the bears.**

The general vividness with which the grizzly impressed himself upon the pioneers as the original native son is indicated by the fact that he was painted, by common consent, as the totem of the commonwealth, on the first flag of the '^ California Republic.*'

For several years strenuous efforts have been made to obtain au- thentic records of living grizzlies in California, so far without success. It seems quite safe to state that each and eveiy one of the six species is now completely extirpated from our fauna.

For the outline of the former range of these bears we must look forward to the publication of the results of Dr. Merriam's exhaustive researches. The fragmentary material now available will not permit of any detailed distributional statements. The actual dates of extermina- tion of the various species are uncertain. The skull from the southern Sierra Nevada, which became the type of Urtua kenshawi, was collected by Dr. J. T. Eothrock and H. W. Henshaw in 1876. Two specimens, skins only, from the Tehachapi region, and supposedly referable to Ursus calif omicus tularensis, are in the Muse\im of Vertebrate Zoology and were collected in the Tejon (or San Emigdio) Mountains, between San Emigdio Banch and Old Fort Tejon, between 1893 and 1896. The type of the huge Ursus magister of southern California was shot in the Santa Ana Mountains in August, 1900 or 1901, and there are no known records subsequent to this date.

The Zoologist and the Prbsbbvation op the Native Fauka

That California's early endowment of wild life was generous indeed seems clearly to be indicated by this brief survey; and that there has been a steady decrease in numbers of practically all the game and fur- bearing mammals seems to be equally dear. We now count, among mammals alone, at least eight species which are totally extirpated from our fauna.

Nor is California a special offender. The same story of the dwind- ling numbers of the native animals is repeated in nearly every state of the Union; and similar stories are told in Europe, Asia^ Africa, South America and Australia.

•B"ffistory of Calif oTnia," 2, 1898, pp. 56(M561. s« Pac. B. B. Beports, 6, Zoology, p. 47.

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