Marten
Martes americana (Latin: a marten ... America)
Range: North America from Alaska through the greater part of Canada, thence through northwestern, United States and south into California, Utah, Colorado, and New Mexico.
Habitat: Usually coniferous forests of the Canadian Life Zone up to the Alpine Zone.
Description: In the trees, this animal is often mistaken for a large squirrel. On closer inspection it will resemble a house cat with a short, bushy tail. Total length 22 to 27 inches. Tail 7 to 9 inches. Weight 2 to 4 pounds. The coloration of the marten is distinctive. The body is a beautiful, soft, yellow-brown, darker on the back, legs and tail. On the chest the color lightens to a pale buff or sometimes a rather distinct orange. The underparts are lighter than the rest of the body. The fur is extremely fine and thick. It is distinctive in being almost entirely underfur, there being very few guard hairs. The body is extremely graceful with relatively long legs and small feet. The head is small with features somewhat resembling those of the weasel. The ears are large for a member of the weasel family and lend an alert appearance to the face. This alertness is further borne out by the lively movements of this animal, which is the most active of any in that group.
The marten, often called “pine marten,” is one of the most solitary animals of a group whose members habitually travel alone. Perhaps this is because in this family of predators each species is fully able to overpower any resistance put up by its accustomed prey, individually and not through force in numbers. Perhaps, too, it is because the entire group is made up of voracious eaters which, if they ran in packs, could not encounter enough prey to adequately feed them all. Finally, this clan has several species which instinctively kill far in excess of normal needs. This is a practice which, almost without exception, is confined to those members of the weasel family which prey on rodents. It is evidently one of Nature’s methods of controlling the rodent population. To operate at highest efficiency these killers should hunt alone. These factors all apply in some degree to the marten. As a consequence, although there may be many in an area, the marten is usually found alone except for a brief time during the breeding season or in the case of a female with young. The male evidently has no part in bringing up the family.
The marten has always been more or less plentiful throughout its range, and there is no reason to believe that it will not continue to be seen by alert observers for many years to come. Its chosen habitat is among the evergreens near timberline. This is also an area of rock slides, and the marten loves to hunt the small rodents which make their homes there. Indeed, it divides its time between the two environments, hunting in the talus slopes during summer months, and taking to the trees in winter when rock slides are buried deep beneath the snow. It is an extremely hardy creature which holes up in an abandoned squirrel or woodpecker nest only during the short periods of storm, when hunting would be useless. As might be expected, its summer and winter diets vary widely. Both, however, have as their basic item the spruce squirrel, the important host of the marten, and like it a hardy creature that is abroad throughout the year.
There is considerable variety in the summer diet. On and in the ground there is available an amazing number of species which are denied to the marten during the winter, some because of protection afforded them by the deep snowdrifts and others because they hibernate. Among these are pikas, ground squirrels, woodrats, chipmunks, and many species of mice. In summer, the marten also takes eggs and young of ground-nesting birds. In the trees are found other nests, not excepting those of the woodpecker, into which the marten inserts its forepaw and comes out not only with young birds, but often the adult as well. Martens are known to eat quantities of the larger insects and, since they are fond of fruits and berries when raised in captivity, there is little doubt that they indulge in these delicacies in the wild.
Winter diet consists of the spruce squirrel, augmented by such other small creatures as may be abroad during cold weather. Though it would seem that the marten might suffer from the curtailment of its lavish summer menu, the opposite is the case. They remain fat and healthy under weather conditions that would seriously hamper most other predators. To a large extent, this ability to survive is due to the untiring perseverance and great skill with which they hunt. In addition, few creatures have been endowed with so many adaptations with which to withstand the long, cold winter.
