Part 18

=Yukon.= Kamarkak, 1; Herschel Island, 1; Lapierres House, 2; Forty Mile, L. T. Coal Cr., 4; head of Coal Cr., 1; Macmillan River, Forks, 1; 20 mi. W. Ft. Selkirk, 1; Slims River, near Kluane, 1; head of Lake Lebarge, 1.

=Mustela erminea polaris= (Barrett-Hamilton)

Ermine

Putorius arcticus polaris Barrett-Hamilton, Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist., 13 (ser. 7):393, May, 1904.

Mustela erminea, Manniche, Meddelelser on Grønland, 45:80-85, 1 fig., 1910.

Mustela arctica polaris, Miller, U. S. Nat. Mus. Bull., 79:97, December 31, 1912.

Mustela erminea polaris, Hall, Journ. Mamm., 26:179, July 19, 1945.

Type.--Probably female, skin only; no. 78. 6. 19. 11, Brit. Mus. Nat. Hist.; Gap Valley, 7-1/4 miles northeast Cape Brevoort, 82° N, 59° 20´ W, Northwestern Greenland; June 15 or 16, 1876; obtained by Lewis A. Beaumont.

The skin is in full, fresh summer pelage, fairly well stuffed except for the tail which is unstuffed; the whole is in a good state of preservation.

Range.--North coast, and east coast as far south as Turner Sound (between 69 and 70 degrees) of Greenland. See figure 25 on page 95.

Characters for ready recognition.--Differs from M. e. arctica in lighter upper parts (near [j] Buckthorn Brown rather than Raw Umber or darker) and more intensely-colored underparts that are Buff Yellow rather than Sulphur Yellow, Colonial Buff, or Primrose Yellow; from M. e. semplei in color in same fashion as from arctica and in larger size of skull.

Description.--Size.--Male: One subadult and two adults (one ad. from Scøresby Sound and other two from Ymer Island) measure as follows, the average being given first: Total length, 318 (301, 320, 315); length of tail, 72 (69, 70, 73); length of hind foot, 46.5 (44, 46, 47).

Female: No measurements taken in the flesh available but hind foot, measuring 33.5 in the dried state and therefore approximately 35 in life.

Color.--As described in Mustela erminea arctica except that upper parts in summer near (j) Buckthorn Brown and tone 4 of Dark Fawn of plate 307 to tone 1 of Raw Umber of plate 301 of Oberthür and Dauthenay. Underparts Buff-Yellow. Least width of color of underparts averaging, in 3 males, 66 (57-72) per cent of greatest width of color of upper parts. Black tip of tail in same males averaging 71 (70-72) mm. which is 99 (99-104) per cent of length of tail-vertebrae.

The lighter-colored upper parts and more intensely yellow underparts are the distinguishing features of the subspecies polaris in comparison with other races of American M. erminea.

Skull.--Male (based on 5 adults from eastern Greenland): See measurements. As described in Mustela erminea richardsonii except that: Weight more (not recorded); basilar length, 41.3 (39.0-42.4); length of tooth-rows more than length of tympanic bulla; breadth of rostrum measured across lacrimal processes averaging more than a third of basilar length; interorbital breadth more than distance between glenoid fossa and posterior border of external auditory meatus; zygomatic breadth more than distance between last upper molar and jugular foramen.

Female (based on 2 adults, Turner Sund and Kap Hoeg): See measurements. As described in Mustela erminea arctica except that basilar length 36.8 (35.9, 37.8), and length of tooth-rows not more than length of tympanic bulla. Skulls of females not in hand when this comparison is written; only the recorded measurements are available.

To me the skull of polaris is indistinguishable from that of arctica. Therefore the comparisons made of the skull of arctica with those of other subspecies will apply also for polaris.

Remarks.--In view of the heretofore erroneous assignment of the type locality of Mustela erminea audax to Greenland, pains were taken to verify the statement by Barrett-Hamilton (1904:393) relative to the type specimen of polaris. Taking pains thus seemed the more worthwhile because in the specimen register at the British Museum of Natural History, there is written to the right of catalogue numbers 78-6 = 19 nos. 1-11, "Discovery Bay Presented by Mr. Hart Arctic Collection." This refers to no. 78.6.19.1. There are no ditto marks below but by implication this data applies also to nos. 1-11, which include the holotype of polaris. A label attached to the specimen does however give the locality as "Hall Land" "N Greenland" and another label has on it "Ermine, procured by Mr. Beaumont Greenland Lat 89° Long W 59-20." The 89° is obviously a mistake (on the label or in my transcription of it) for 82°.

Reference to Nares (1877:385) reveals that Lieutenant Lewis A. Beaumont, under date of June 15 and 16, 1876, wrote in his field journal as follows: "I shot an ermine." In the daily accounts of his journey from Discovery Bay on Grinnell Land [= Ellesmere Island], across Robeson Channel and along the north coast of Greenland to the west base of Mount Farragut near 50° 30´ W he mentions the ermine only this once. For several other kinds of animals, Beaumont mentions individuals seen or shot, often with the notation that this is the second, or third seen. This mention of a kind of animal whenever seen was in accordance with orders. On page 39 of the Discovery Report (op. cit., 1877) in "General orders to sledging parties" by Captain G. S. Nares, Commanding the Expedition, we find ". . . note daily: IV State the animals seen and those shot." Reference to the map facing page 358 of the (op. cit.) report reveals that on the 15th and 16th, camps were made by Beaumont in Gap Valley, each 7-3/4 miles northeast of Cape Brevoort, one camp on either side of the 82° line, and separated from each other by a distance of only 2-1/4 air line miles or 4-1/2 miles march according to his journal.

These several data, then, are the bases for designating the type locality of M. e. polaris, in the way that I have stated it at the beginning of this account of the subspecies.

The light-colored upper parts and more intensely yellow underparts well differentiate this subspecies from arctica or semplei. Intergradation is suggested by a skin, no. 1462, Copenhagen Zoological Museum, from Axel Heibergs Land, the color of the underparts of which agrees with that of specimens from Greenland. Also the color of the upper parts is decidedly nearer that of animals from Greenland than to that of specimens from Ponds Inlet, Tulican and Gifford River. No other specimens west or south of Greenland suggest intergradation. In Greenland itself, one adult, a female from Turner Sund, East Greenland, has the underparts no more yellowish than in some specimens from Melville Peninsula. This female is darker on the back than any one of the other 10 specimens from Greenland in summer pelage examined at the same time, but even so is not so dark colored as animals from Baffin Island or other islands to the west of Greenland.

The final summation of information about this subspecies would have been more precise if I had been able to have actually in hand, at the time of writing, specimens preserved in the Copenhagen Zoological Museum. The war made it impractical to secure the loan of these as previously planned. Even so, the measurements and notes on color that I obtained from this material, in 1937, in Copenhagen, suffice to prove that the subspecies polaris is well set off in color from the other American subspecies of Mustela erminea.

The best material of this subspecies is in the University Zoological Museum at Copenhagen, Denmark.

Specimens examined.--Total number, 35, arranged by locality from the western end of the north coast of Greenland, eastward and then southward down the east coast. Unless otherwise indicated, specimens are in the Universitetets Zoologisk Museum, Købnhavn, Danmark.

Gap Valley, 7-1/4 mi. NE Cape Brevoort, 82 N, 59 20´ W, 1 (British Mus.); Dragon Point, 1; Danmarks Havn (Fjeldene ved Baadskjeret, 1; lille Fjeld, 1; Lyservig, 1; harefjeldets, 4; Rypefjeldet, 1; Baadskjeret, 1; Danmarkshavn, 3) 12; Christians Havn, 1 (not found on map); Shannon Island, 4; Germania Havn, 2; Claveringoen, 1; Carls Havn, 1; Myggbukta, 2 (British Mus.); Ymer Island, 2 (Mus. Comp. Zool.); Kap Hoegh, Jamesonsland, 1 (Berlin Zool. Mus.); Scoresby Sund, 3; Turner Sund, 4.

=Mustela erminea semplei= Sutton and Hamilton

Ermine