894 Life-histories of Northern Animals 



in others — the difference probably depending upon season and 

 age. In one specimen the fetor was so intolerably rank and 

 loathsome that I was unable to skin it at one sitting, and, I am 

 free to confess, it is one of the few substances of animal, vege- 

 table, or mineral origin that have, on land or sea, rendered me 

 aware of the existence of the abominable sensation called 



MiGRA- During October and November I have sometimes thought 



I saw signs of migration among the Mink, but it was quite 

 erratic and may have been nothing more than the general 

 rush for good places in which to settle for the winter, before 

 the frost imposes on them a marked change in life. At this 

 time I have often seen them out on the open prairie or in the 

 daytime far from cover. At one or two farmhouses near 

 Carberry, where I learned that Mink had arrived after the 

 first snow, the tracks came from the north-west, but this may 

 not have meant anything. 



TRAP- Though more wary than Skunk or Weasel, the Mink is 



easily trapped. Some of the old ones that have had painful 

 experiences, become cunning, but most of them are unsuspicious 

 of danger in any inanimate form, and will enter the most obvious 

 of traps, especially if they be baited with the head or blood and 

 brains of some large bird, delicacies that have as strong an 

 appeal to the Mink as catnip for a cat, or honey for a Bear. 



In the fall of 1886, I put out a steel trap for a Mink that 

 used to travel up the old DeWinton Slough, back of Carberry. 

 The trap was set, by luck, just the day before he passed that 

 way, but, unfortunately, a ruffed grouse chanced to run 

 through the thicket and get into the trap, so the Mink, coming 

 on the scene, discovered a feast ready prepared for him. On 

 returning next day I found the remains of the grouse with 

 other details of the affair, so reset the trap in the same place. 

 Lutreola was lurking near; next night I caught him by the 

 front foot, but he gnawed the foot off and escaped. I was 

 prevented returring to the trap for several days. Then I 



