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Updated: May 10, 2025
By "barking squirrels" the reader must understand that the animal better known as the prairie-dog is meant; and the mule-deer, as the explorers called it, was not a hybrid, but a deer with very long ears, better known afterwards as the black-tailed deer. At the Big Bend of the Missouri, in the heart of what is now South Dakota, while camped on a sand-bar, the explorers had a startling experience.
Deer seldom cross the range in either direction. I have never yet observed a single specimen of the mule-deer of the Great Basin west of the summit, and rarely one of the black-tailed species on the eastern slope, notwithstanding many of the latter ascend the range nearly to the summit every summer, to feed in the wild gardens and bring forth their young.
Upon it roams the buffalo, the prong-horned antelope, and the mule-deer. There, too, may be seen the "barking-wolf" and the "swift fox." It is the favourite home of the marmots, and the gauffres or sand-rats; and there, too, the noblest of animals, the horse, runs wild. West of this prairie tract is a region of far different aspect, the region of the Rocky Mountains.
Here they saw great numbers of the burrowing-squirrel, also some wolves, antelopes, mule-deer, and vast herds of buffalo. They soon crossed a ridge considerably higher than the surrounding plains, and from its top had a beautiful view of the Rocky Mountains, which are now completely covered with snow.
They were running about on the hills, or standing still to look at the ship until the noise frightened them off. At that time the whole country was covered with thick trees and bushes where the wolf and coyote prowled, and the grizzly bear's track was seen everywhere. There are plenty of deer in the redwoods now, and in the high Sierras are black-tailed and large mule-deer.
At the distance of six miles we stopped on a bleak sand-bar, where we thought ourselves secure from any attack during the night, and also safe from the mosquitoes. We had made but twenty-two miles, but in the course of the day had killed a mule-deer, an animal we were very anxious to obtain.
They gradually grow narrower, however, as you proceed farther north, until, on reaching the latitude of the Great Slave Lake, they end altogether. This "prairie-land" has its peculiar animals. Upon it roams the buffalo, the prong-horned antelope, and the mule-deer. There, too, may be seen the "barking wolf" and the "swift fox."
Both the black-tail deer and the mule-deer are to be met with in that country, but, somewhat strange to say, they are, as a rule, more plentiful round the smaller settlements than in the wilderness, and they are always singularly difficult to see.
Among our acquisitions to-day were a mule-deer, a magpie, a common deer, and buffalo: Captain Lewis also saw a hare, and killed a rattlesnake near the burrows of the barking squirrels."
The hunters, who were out the greater part of the day, brought in six elk, two buffalo, two mule-deer, and a bear. This last animal had nearly cost us the lives of two of our hunters, who were together when he attacked them.
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