TRAPPING, SNARING, NETTING, ^c. 135 



There is a treadle inside, and as soon as that is touched 

 the doors close and the victim is imprisoned. I have 

 had many of these traps in use for some years, set in 

 runs and at drains about my garden, where they re- 

 main the whole year round, and I scarcely ever visit 

 them without finding something caught. For stoats, 

 weasels, hedgehogs, rats, squirrels, rabbits, and almost 

 every other kind of quadruped they are invaluable, and 

 one advantage they possess over other traps is that they 

 can be set all through the winter, as neither frost nor 

 snow affects them. In setting them in runs under 

 shelving banks or by the side of wire netting, I usually 

 make wings at each end of fir boughs, or something of 

 that kind, to guide the animal in, but when set at 

 drains or holes, it is only necessary to make a wing at 

 the end furthest from the hole, the trap at the other 

 end fitting close up to the entrance of the drain. If a 

 rabbit is found freshly killed by a stoat or weasel, it is 

 a good plan to place it inside the trap at one end, and 

 to set it with only one door open (the door, of course, 

 furthest from the rabbit), so that the stoat has to step 

 on the table to get to it. I find these traps most use- 

 ful also set in this way, i.e. with only one door open, 

 for catching ferrets that have laid up. In fact, if set 

 at the main entrance of the earth the ferret is in, and 

 the rest of the holes stopped, it is certain to be found 



