Botanists, despairing of an exact name, joined a Greek and a Japanese word and called it Pseudotsuaga, False Hemlock. Alas, poor Douglas tree, neither pine, nor spruce, nor fir, nor yet a hemlock. By S. B. Jones, Ranger-Naturalist. They toil not, neither do they spin, may apply very well to the Lilies of the Field, but life does not often run that smoothly for the four-footed creatures of the wild. True, there are seasons of plenty when Mother Nature is generous with her children, but there are also times of want when the good old Dame finds that cupboard is bare and the wild things suffer and die.
Winter is always a time of famine in the wilderness.
Starvation stalks the hills and death follows in his wake. Since food is so hard to obtain, the wild animals have been forced to discover means of outwitting starvation. Those that fail to do so do not survive. With the coming of spring the struggle becomes less intense but even in times of normal supply the wild-folk must work if they would eat. The deer may come to the waiting cougar and the salmon to the paw of the fishing bear but the cougar and the bear wait hungry hours for the game to come.