There is a continuing demand from sheep ranchers in the county that foxes be controlled, yet this species seems to maintain considerably higher populations than does the coyote. According to federal trapper Robert Kriege (personal communication), dens of the red fox have been found principally in the badlands and in certain grassland areas, but rarely in the buttes proper. Records kept by Mr. Kriege indicate that litters are born in mid-March in Harding County. He estimated that over the past few years he has examined whelps from an average of 50 dens a year, but that more than 170 dens were found in the spring of 1963. ~Ursus americanus americanus~ Pallas, 1780 Black Bear Visher (1914:91) reported that a black bear "was seen near the Cave Hills in July, 1910." He further noted: "Bears have been recently killed in the Long Pine and Ekalaka forests [of adjacent Montana], but their day of extermination is here near at hand." We know of no other reports of this carnivore from the area. ~Ursus arctos horribilis~ Ord, 1815 Grizzly Bear According to Visher (1914:91) a grizzly bear was killed in the early 1890's a short distance southwest of Camp Crook. ~Procyon lotor hirtus~ Nelson and Goldman, 1930 Raccoon _Specimens examined_ (10).--2 mi. N, 5 mi. W Ludlow, 4; 1/2 mi. W Reva, 1; 4 mi. E Reva, 2; NW 1/4 sec. 32, R. 1 E, T. 20 N, 3. The raccoon evidently is one of the commonest carnivores in Harding County. On June 24, 1961, a den with three young (average total length, 429) was found in one of the numerous pockets eroded from the caprock of the North Cave Hills, and on May 21, 1968, another den, this one containing five young (average total length of three, 271), was found in a similar situation on the east edge of the Long Pine Hills. A female trapped on June 20, 1961, was lactating. Three individuals that had been killed at Ralph, along nearly treeless Big Nasty Creek, were examined on May 28, 1968. ~Mustela frenata longicauda~ Bonaparte, 1838 Long-tailed Weasel This mustelid seems uncommon in northwestern South Dakota. The only recent reports from Harding County that have come to our attention are of a female and four or five young that were found in a haystack "several years prior to 1963" (Robert Kriege, personal communication), and of several individuals seen by a rancher in a hay field along the Little Missouri about 7 mi. N Camp Crook during mowing operations in July 1970. Visher (1914:91) regarded the species as "quite common," and noted that "4 or 5 dead ones" were seen along roads in the summer of 1910. ~Mustela nigripes~ (Audubon and Bachman, 1851) Black-footed Ferret