The Portland daily press., 1896-10-01
NEW YoRK's WILD BEASTS.
The Wolf, the wildcat, the Lynx and the
Beaver Still Lingering in the Woods.
New York 6un.)

franklin county, although tired of
paying for the cars of slain black bears,
has recently reimposed the bounty on
wolves, though wolves are extremely
scarce in this county, as elsewhere in the
Adirondacks. A veracious old guide,
more than forty years In the business,
says that the wolves disappeared from
his part of the county in single year.
They seemed one season to be bowling
| from every square yard about Wolf Pond
| and the next year there was not wolf to
| be seen or heard in the whole region.
Five or six years afterward. however,
this same guide rallied forty of his
neighbors to hunt down pack of five
ferooious creatues-part dog, part wolf
that ravaged sheepfolds and roamed
about the farm buildings in broad day
| light. The farmers surl ounded the pack
and slew three of them, but the other
two, including a mongrel-half wolf. half
bulldog-escaped, after whipping all the
| dogs that were brought to the hunt.
Since that time he has never seen nor
heard wolf.
Painters or catamounts, as wildcats
are called in these parts, are now very
scarce save in the true Willis of the Adir-
ondaoks. Someone now and then reports
having seen a wildcat while deer hunt
ing, hut the creatures are seldom killed,
and they are oftener heard than seen
The males have q way of walking by
moonlight and bowling for their mates.
The sound is about the most blood
curdling one that the wilderness knows,
but the wildcat Ia not really O danger Gus
creature save when brought to bay. The
lynx, still found In these parts, is no
more dangerous than tho wildca5 or the
bear, but he has an unpleasant habit of
following the human pedestrian. The
guides tell stories of being followed all
night and half the day by these. tirelesa
creatures. The Adirondack lynx, how
ever, does not attack man, though he Is
dangerous creature for any dog to
tackle.
There are yet lingering traditions OF
, the days when moose roamed the Adiron-
dacks. An old guide recalls that his
older brother shot "a moose nearly fifty
years ago on Lower Saranao lake. 1t il
many years since any have been seen In
! even the widest parts of the wilderness
Caribou had been thought extinct IL
these parts for some years when a guide
. shot one of a pair near Meecham Lake
, in a lonely corner of this county. They
Even the almost extinct beaver still per
forms hie miracle Of instinct upon few
! streams of this county. Most Of rh
8 beavers were trapped out of existenc
twenty OF twenty five years ago. but nov
thns they are specially protected by Law
: they may survey for long time to come
A beaver colony has long operated on tn
outlet TO Mcdonald Pond, twenty O
= thirty miles from this point. They hav
several fine dams on the stream, one o
them backing MP large area of water
The outlet to the S. Regis lakes flow
not far from Mcdonald Pond, and o.
n this little stream there was recently
colony of beavers OF work. They ha
five dams on a single mile of the stream
and it was vastly improved for tn,
guides by the operations of the beavers
Q for the little Adirondack boats easil
i foated on the water thus deepened an
y slipped without difficulty over the daI
breasts. H.