merit badge question

[tfarmer 10]

Our boys got the heritage merit badge for tracking. I can't figure out what animal is on it. It looks like a mangy yellow dog, but has a lion tail. Is it a mountain lion?

[oldisnewagain1 42]

That's an easy one... it's a northern snow chupacabra (This message has been edited by oldisnewagain1)

[Oak Tree 15]

I had not thought about how odd that image was.

 

Are we encouraging our Scouts to go track mountain lions? That would seem, shall we say, sure to violate some G2SS rule, you'd think.

 

I am guessing mountain lion for the animal despite some of the oddities about the image. It's a very long tail, and a mountain lion is really the only North American animal that comes to mind that would have an extra long, black-tipped tail.

[tfarmer 10]

Thanks oldisnewagain1, I should have known that. Sometimes, I think the meritbadge designer made this animal up just to mess with us.

[shortridge 184]

Blame the graphic designers of the 1930s (or before? not sure). The MB isn't a new design - it's just a revamp of the old.

 

http://meritbadge.org/wiki/index.php/Image:Stalking2.JPG

[neil_b 10]

I imagine the image has something to do with a cat stalking its prey, not a scout stalking a big cat.

[AK-Eagle 19]

At the time the badge was designed it was called the "Stalking" Merit Badge, not a good term today I suppose. ;-)