Old postcards Mammals

The mammal cards in this section span twenty years, from Corsac Fox (1969) to Hamster and Cheetah (1989). The largest group dates from the mid-1980s, while the 1978 cards — Hare, Roe Deer and Squirrel — show familiar animals of woods and fields.

A good share of these Soviet postcards is given to animals of the steppe and Siberia. The corsac, or steppe fox, lives in the steppes, semi-deserts and deserts of Central Asia and into Mongolia; its English name comes from the Russian korsak. The bobak marmot (1985) is a large rodent of the Eurasian steppes that hibernates for more than half the year. The kolonok, or Siberian weasel (1985), is a member of the weasel family whose tail hair is used for soft brushes.

The big cats include Amur Tiger Cub (1987); the Amur tiger lives in the Russian Far East and north-eastern China. The cards Cheetahs (1988) and Cheetah (1989) show the fastest land animal, which in the past also ranged across Central Asia. Dolphin (1985) is a reminder that marine animals belong to the mammals as well.

The roe deer appears twice, on a 1978 and a 1985 card, which makes it easy to compare how the same animal was treated seven years apart.