[Scheffer] and [Slipp] (1944: 401) found that the young were born in late May along the ocean coast and in June and July in Puget Sound. The young seal mentioned as having been kept captive at Friday Harbor was obtained from an Indian on July 26, 1938, and was said to be two weeks old at the time. The Indian said that he had watched the birth of the young and then killed the mother for bounty. On July 28 the young seal weighed approximately 20 pounds and was in good health. The seal could swim well. It was said to have been born "on the rocks" at Long Island, San Juan County. The seal drank milk from a baby's bottle but refused fresh scallops, clams and fish of several species. When put into a large, screened box sunk in the water it at once investigated the other animals in the box. It showed no fear of a large bull cod weighing 50 pounds, or of a 20-pound skate and several sharks 5 feet long but seemed to be frightened by a large octopus weighing about 30 pounds. In swimming, the front flippers were held flat against the body and the actual swimming was accomplished by the vertically-held rear flippers and the rapid swinging of the hips. Its eyes were very dark brown, almost black, but soft and appealing. The bases of the vibrissae were thick and soft. The belly was silvery white and unspotted. The sides and back were iron gray spotted with dark, bluish gray, the whole overlaid with a silvery tint. The claws were long, round, and sharply pointed.
When sleeping, the seal usually lay on its side, occasionally upon its back or belly. The front flippers were held tight to its sides but the back flippers were held straight back with the digits bent inward at right angles and laid so that the right digits were against the left. In moving on land the front flippers were folded into fists and used to push the animal forward while the body was moved by snakelike motions of the hips. It breathed in short gasps.
Genus Tamias Illiger
Chipmunks
The chipmunks of Asia and western North America have usually been separated under the generic name Eutamias from those of the genus Tamias of eastern America. [Ellerman] (1940: 428) placed both in the same genus and [Bryant] (1945: 257-390) reached the same conclusions after intensive study of American sciurids. [Bryant]'s treatment is followed here. The sciurid genera as they occur in Washington, are listed by [Bryant] as follows: Tamias, Marmota, Citellus, Sciurus, Tamiasciurus, Glaucomys. This order, rather than that of [Miller] (1924) is used here. Four species of Tamias are listed for Washington: minimus represented by two subspecies; amoenus, by six; ruficaudus by one; and townsendii, by two.
Chipmunks from Washington vary in size from less than 8 inches in total length to more than 10 inches in total length. Some race of chipmunk occurs in almost every part of Washington. Their striped color pattern serves as a universal recognition mark. The somewhat similarly striped mantled ground squirrel is often mistakenly called chipmunk. The mantled ground squirrel is larger than any chipmunk, has but two dark stripes as compared with five dark stripes of chipmunks, and has a plain, reddish head unlike the distinctly striped head of Tamias.
Like most members of the squirrel family, chipmunks are active by day and are therefore better known to man than are most of the other kinds of small mammals, most of which are nocturnal. The attractive color and sprightly actions of chipmunks make them a delightful feature of the outdoors. They feed on fruit, seeds, and fungus and eagerly eat food that can be begged or stolen from man. They have been known to kill mice and they have been accused of destroying nests and eggs of birds. They often eat insects and occasionally eat the flesh of mice or other chipmunks held in collector's traps.
Chipmunks climb trees and bushes readily but only townsendii can be called arboreal, and even it prefers to climb on stumps and dead trunks rather than in living trees. All species are fond of climbing about rocky outcrops and talus slides.
The call of the chipmunks is a birdlike cheep. In minimus it is shrill and uttered rapidly, but it is low-pitched and is uttered by townsendii with longer intervals between the notes. The call of amoenus is of an intermediate nature.