And
heard only a vague report of 3 that an Indian claimed he had seen
in a remote part of the region late in the fall.
Then, since the Lynx is the logical apex of a pyramid of Rabbits,
it naturally goes down when the Rabbits are removed.
These bobtailed cats are actually starving and ready to enter
any kind of a trap or snare that carries a bait. The slaughter of
Lynxes in its relation to the Rabbit supply is shown by the H. B.
Company fur returns as follows:
In 1900, number of skins taken 4,473
" 1901 " 5,781
" 1902 " 9,117
" 1903 " 19,267
" 1904 " 36,116
" 1905 " 58,850
" 1906 " 61,388
" 1907 " 36,201
" 1908 " 9,664
Remembering, then, that the last of the Rabbits were wiped out in
the winter of 1906-7, it will be understood that there were thousands
of starving Lynxes roaming about the country. The number that we
saw, and their conditions, all helped to emphasise the dire story
of plague and famine.
Some of my notes are as follows:
May 18th, Athabaska River, on roof of a trapper's hut found the
bodies of 30 Lynxes.
May 19th, young Lynx shot to-day, female, very thin, weighed only
12 1/2 lbs., should have weighed 25. In its stomach nothing but
the tail of a white-footed mouse. Liver somewhat diseased. In its
bowels at least one tapeworm.
June 3d, a young male Lynx shot to-day by one of the police boys,
as previously recorded. Starving; it weighed only 15 lbs.
June 6th, adult female Lynx killed, weighed 15 lbs.; stomach contained
a Redsquirrel, a Chipmunk, and a Bog-lemming. (Synaptomys borealis.)
June 18th, young male Lynx, weight 13 lbs., shot by Preble on Smith
Landing; had in its stomach a Chipmunk (borealis) and 4 small young
of the same, apparently a week old; also a score of pinworms. How
did it get the Chipmunk family without digging them out?
June 26th, on Salt Mt. found the dried-up body of a Lynx firmly
held in a Bear trap.
June 29th, one of the Jarvis bear-cub skins was destroyed by the
dogs, except a dried-up paw, which he threw out yesterday. This
morning one of the men shot a starving Lynx in camp. Its stomach
contained nothing but the bear paw thrown out last night.
These are a few of my observations; they reflect the general
condition - all were starving. Not one of them had any Rabbit in its
stomach; not one had a bellyful; none of the females were bearing
young this year.
To embellish these severe and skeletal notes, I add some incidents
supplied by various hunters of the north.
Let us remember that the Lynx is a huge cat weighing 25 to 35 or
even 40 lbs., that it is an ordinary cat multiplied by some 4 or
5 diameters, and we shall have a good foundation for comprehension.
