48 The Ottawa Naturalist. 



HUNTING THE BARREN GROUND CARIBOU. 



By Frank Russell, of the State University of Iowa. 



Vague rumors had reached Fort Rae concerning the whereabouts 

 of the "deer " during the last week of October, but it was not until the 

 first of November that a party left the post to hunt them. 



A few years ago the Barren Ground Caribou appeared about the 

 fort regularly upon All Saints Day. They were often killed from the 

 buildings, and throughout the winter might be found near the post. In 

 1877 an unbroken line of caribou crossed the frozen lake near the fort, 

 they were fourteen days in passing and in such a mass that, in the 

 words of an eye witness, "daylight could not be seen " through the 

 column. They are now seldom seen within several miles of Rae. 



The "Fort Hunter,' - ' Tenony, with seven of his followers was just 

 starting upon a seventy-five mile journey toward the north on the 

 evening of the first, when I learned of his intentions, and after agreeing 

 to furnish a few " skins " of flour, tea, and tobacco, and to pay a skin a day 

 for a dog driver it was settled that I might accompany them into the 

 hunting grounds where another chief, Naohmby, had objected to my 

 Lining three months before, on the ground that all the game would 

 desert the country if pursued by a naturalist. 



I loaded my sled with thirty white fish, three days provisions for 

 the dogs, and fifteen pounds of " dry meat " for the " boy," while I 

 shared alternately with each of them during the trip, the rank, " hung 

 fish " driving me to dried meat and the leathery slabs compelling me to 

 return to the fish. 



As the " brigade" only intended getting clear of the fort that even- 

 ing I preferred to remain and make an early start the nexf day. We 

 left the fort at daylight on the second, Yahty running before my dogs. 

 Our course was northward for twelve miles, to the end of the Northern 

 Ann of the Great Slave Lake, whence a channel a hundred yards in 

 width called Willow River continues for half a mile before expanding 

 into a small lake extending toward the northeast and connecting by a 

 number of " schnys " with Lac Brochet. Following the eastern shore 

 of the small lake, we crossed a short portage and traversing a narrow 



