Mammals of Washington, Volume 2: University of Kansas Publications Museum of Natural HistoryDalquest, Walter Woelber
Science
Mammals of Washington, Volume 2: University of Kansas Publications Museum of Natural History
Dalquest, Walter Woelber
Mammals -- Washington (State)
Following the retreat of the glaciers and the establishment of
vegetation on the deglaciated areas, movements of the faunas occurred.
The Rocky Mountain Fauna spread northward and westward, to northeastern
Washington and, in Canada to the Pacific, occupying most of the land
exposed by the glaciers. The Pacific Coastal Fauna spread northward only
as far as the relatively slight barrier of the Fraser River. The Cascade
Mountains became a "no-man's land." The pika and golden-mantled ground
squirrel of the southern Cascades spread northward. Boreal Rocky
Mountain forms with no ecologic competitors from the Pacific Coastal
Fauna occupied the Cascades. Also, coastal species with no Rocky
Mountain competitors occupied the Cascades. Nevertheless, some
competition between members of the two faunas ultimately occurred, and
in instances where closely related forms occurred in the two faunas, one
or the other prevailed in the Cascade Range. For example, the Douglas
squirrel and big jumping mouse are now established in that range, but
the relative of each occurring in the Rocky Mountains is present in the
extreme northeastern Cascades. It is possible that in these two cases,
the related form occurring in the Rocky Mountains has just entered the
area and that competition has just begun. With regard to the flying
squirrel, red-backed mouse and snowshoe rabbit, the more boreal Rocky
Mountain representatives have definitely displaced the coastal forms.
Certain mass movements of mammals are popularly believed to have
occurred with the advance of the ice sheets of the Pleistocene. The
boreal birds and plants on higher peaks of the Cascades and the Sierra
Nevada of California are thought to represent relics of faunas that
moved northward. Such mass movements probably did occur and there is
some evidence of their occurrence in Washington. Probably the
pre-Wisconsin flora of coastal British Columbia consisted of coniferous
forest similar to that of western Washington today. If this were the
case, the mammalian species in British Columbia corresponded closely to
those of western Washington. An influx of such a fauna into coastal
Washington would scarcely be evident today if, indeed, it was noticeable
even then. In eastern Washington, forest species forced southward would
come upon the barren, inhospitable plains and deserts of the Columbian
Plateau.
The greater part of the southward moving forms found refuge in the
Cascade Mountains where, for most of Wisconsin time, they were isolated
in the southern Cascades. Examples are _Sorex palustris_, _Martes
caurina_, _Martes pennanti_, _Gulo luscus_, _Vulpes fulva_, _Lynx
canadensis_, _Tamias amoenus_, _Thomomys talpoides_ (_douglasii_ group),
_Phenacomys intermedius_, _Microtus richardsoni_ and _Ochotona
princeps_. In each of these species little or no subspecific variation
has occurred between the populations in the Cascades of Washington and
the Cascades of Oregon.
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