In the pairing-season, which takes place during December and January, the old rams, like the males of most ruminants, engage in fierce combats for the possession of the females. The ewes give birth to their one or two lambs during April and May; and these, like the lambs of domesticated sheep, are able to run with their mothers at a very early age. When the rams are in good condition, mouflon-mutton, if hung long enough, is excellent for the table.
In Cyprus, Asia Minor, and Persia the mouflon is replaced by the red sheep (Ovis orientalis), a redder and, in the case of some races, larger species, often with a fringe of blackish hair on the throat of the old males, and the horns in that sex always curving backwards behind the neck. The race of this species inhabiting the Troödos mountains of Cyprus is smaller than the rest.
Farther east, namely, in the Kopet Dagh range dividing Persia from Turkestan, the red sheep gives place to the well-known urial (O. vignei), in which there is a long white throat-fringe to the old rams, whose horns curve forwards by the sides of the face. This species ranges through Baluchistan and Afghanistan to the Salt Range of the Punjab, and thence along the ranges flanking the Indus into Ladak and Tibet.
In the Altai and Tibet, together with other parts of central Asia, we reach the country of the great argali sheep (O. ammon), with its numerous races; while in the Yana Valley of Siberia and in Kamchatka we first meet with the so-called bighorns (O. canadensis), of which the typical race is North American. One peculiar species (Ammotragus lervia) inhabits the north of Africa, but in the rest of that continent, as also in peninsular India, the Malay countries, and South America, wild sheep are unknown.
THE RED DEER
(Cervus elaphus)
THE red deer, the typical representative of the family Cervidæ, is the largest and handsomest European member of that group, although it attains its maximum development in point of bodily size and massiveness of antlers only in eastern Europe and south-western Asia. As in most members of the deer tribe inhabiting temperate countries, there is considerable seasonal difference in the colour of the coat, and the fawns differ remarkably in this respect from their parents. There are also distinctions in colour between the various local races of the species. The ordinary name refers to the fact that in summer a more or less distinct rufous colour prevails on the upper-parts. Here it may be remarked that deer do not in most cases present that marked contrast between the upper and the lower surfaces of the body so characteristic of gazelles and many other members of the antelope group. And the reason for this is not difficult to explain. As mentioned in the text accompanying the plate of that species, the white under-parts of the gazelle are for the purpose of counteracting the dark shadow thrown by the body when standing in full sunlight, and thus to render the animal inconspicuous. Deer, on the other hand, are in the main nocturnal and forest-dwelling creatures, and this type of protective colouring would therefore be useless in their case. The chital, or Indian spotted deer, is, however, much less nocturnal than most species, and also feeds to a great extent in the open; and it is interesting to notice that, in accordance with such habits, this species is white-bellied.
Notable features in the red deer are the shortness of the tail, and the straw-coloured patch on the buttocks in which that brief appendage is included; the same features recurring in its near relative the wapiti. As in all similar cases among ruminants, the light rump-patch serves as a guide to the members of a herd; the place of this being taken in certain other species, such as the fallow deer and the American white-tailed deer, by the pure white under surface of the tail, which is raised when the animals are running.
The antlers of the stag are characterised by the number and regular arrangement of the tines; and more especially, in their fullest development, by the duplication of the first, or brow, tine, and the cup-like arrangement of the terminal snags.
