Up to the present time it appears that remains of musk-oxen have been found in Michigan in only two localities, Manchester, Washtenaw County, and near Moorland, in Muskegon County. These remains belonged to two different genera, Symbos and Boötherium.
1. Manchester, Washtenaw County.—In No. 13 of the Occasional Papers of the Museum of Zoology, pages 1–3, plates I, II, issued by the University of Michigan, November 12, 1915, Dr. E. C. Case reported the finding of a fine skull of Symbos cavifrons at a place near Manchester. This was given by Case as being about 3 miles northeast of Manchester, but Mr. Schlicht, owner of the farm, has sent the writer a description and plat of the section which show that the spot is situated about 0.5 mile northwest of the town. It is near the center of the northwest quarter of the northwest quarter of section 1, township 4 south, range 3 east. A drain was being made in a swampy tract and the skull was found at a depth of 4 feet, lying on a bed of clay. This was covered by a black muck filled with plant remains and interrupted by a few thin layers of fine gravel.
The skull was in fine condition, but lacked the lower jaw. The spade of a workman struck the nose and injured the bones so that some parts were lost. The teeth were almost perfectly preserved.
The locality which furnished this skull is in the valley of the Raisin River. According to Leverett’s glacial map of Michigan (Monogr. U. S. Geol. Surv., LIII, plate VII), this valley crosses, at this point, the northern end of the Fort Wayne moraine. It is not improbable that this musk-ox lived when the foot of the ice-sheet was not far removed. Even in case the skull had gotten into a drainage channel it could not, because of its fine state of preservation, have been moved far from where the animal died. The circumstances appear to indicate that the skull had been left on the clayey bottom of a shallow pond of a tundra and become covered by the muck of a milder epoch.
2. Moorland, Muskegon County.—In 1908 (Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., vol. XXXIV, p. 683, plate LXXIX), J. W. Gidley described, as belonging to a new species, Boötherium sargenti, a skull of a musk-ox found on the farm of Mr. Charles McKay, reported to be near Grand Rapids. Further inquiry showed that the farm is located near Moorland, in the northeast quarter of section 16, township 10 north, range 14 west. The skull was found in a marsh at a depth of 2 or 3 feet and lying beneath the pelvis of a mastodon. It and the mastodon are now preserved in the Kent Scientific Museum, at Grand Rapids, Michigan.
In 1915 (Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., vol. XLVIII, p. 525, plate XXXI), the writer redescribed the specimen. Dr. J. A. Allen, in 1913 (Mem. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., vol. I, pp. 214, 215), referred to this skull and concluded that it had belonged to the female of Symbos cavifrons. The writer does not accept this opinion. He has examined more than 25 skulls of S. cavifrons, some of which must have been females. In none did the rough surfaces for the horns fail to meet at the midline as it does fail in the Moorland specimen.
The Moorland marsh is surrounded by what Leverett has called the Lake Border moraines. It is probable that this musk-ox existed there after, but not long after, the ice had withdrawn into Lake Michigan. From what is known about the habits of musk-oxen in general, we must conclude that the climate was yet cold.
The fact that the mastodon remains were so closely associated with the musk-ox skull does not prove that the animals lived there together. Near Alma, in Gratiot County, the late Charles A. Davis found mastodon bones in a peat-bog within a few inches of the surface. If by chance the pelvis of a modern horse or cow had fallen on that spot, it might easily have been pressed down into contact with those bones.
INDIANA.
(Map [25].)