Note on the Arctic Fox (Canis lagopus)

Abstract

A RATHER peculiar error in regard to this animal seems in danger of being perpetuated in certain contemporary literature, in which it is stated that, while in the other regions of its distribution the Arctic fox generally acquires a white winter coat, in Iceland this change never takes place, but that all the foxes there are blue. As a matter of fact, this fox turns white in the Icelandic winter as elsewhere, with this reservation only, that the proportion of blue winter forms there is greater than the proportion in the Arctic regions generally, the white forms, however, probably still remaining in an actual majority. I believe this occurrence of the white phase in Iceland is so far well known that I need not dwell on the evidence for it; from personal experience, however, I can corroborate it. It is a small point, but in so far as error is abroad, it seems advisable to correct it.