Democratic Sentinel, Volume 20, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 May 1896 — Old Animals in England. [ARTICLE]

Old Animals in England.

The beaver is one of the five mam malian animals that have inhabited England in former times, and have become extinct within historic record. They are the brown bear (Ursus arctoc), the beaver (Castor fiber), the reindeer (Tarandus rangifer), the wild boar (Sus scrofa) and the wolf (Canis lupus). The bear was abundant In the North of England and in Scotland when this country was in the hands of the Romans,and many Caledonian bears were imported into Rome. They disappeared altogether about 750. The beaver was numerous in some localities in the North of Wales In 940 and again in 1188. There are records of them much later in Scotland. Wild boars were numerous when large tracts of woods gave them harbor. They were hunted by the Tudors. They certainly existed in the year 1617. and probably much later. The wolf in England disappeared about 1490. In Scotland, wolves were numerous in 1577. According to Pennant, they became extinct in 1680.—Notes and Queries.