336 THE TRAPPER. 



when the ducks are looking in that direction he wags his 

 little tail (like a shaving brush) from side to side. The 

 curiosity of the ducks is excited, they swim towards the 

 moving object until one of them gets within three or four 

 yards of the bank, when the loupcervier pounces upon it. 

 The fox also gets the credit of this stratagem, and I can 

 quite believe it of either of these quadrupeds in the case of 

 perfectly unsophisticated ducks, some species of the latter 

 being of a very curious and inquisitive disposition. From 

 this is derived the system of toling ducks with trained dogs 

 as practised in the United States. The loupcervier is a 

 bold and excellent swimmer, and also a good tree climber. 

 They are very easily trapped. A small bough camp is made 

 with a bait tied to a stake at one end, and at the other a 

 doorway, across which two slanting pieces of stick crossing 

 at the centre are stuck into the ground to form a door- 

 step, inside these a steel trap is set nicely concealed, or 

 when the trapper has no steel traps a cord noose is set in 

 the doorway made fast to the end of a stout spring pole. 

 The best season to trap loupcervier is in the month of 

 March, when the males are running after the females. 

 The trapper perfumes his traps with the musk of the 

 musquash, or else, and better still, with the oil bag of the 

 beaver. The females carry their young nine weeks. The 

 fur is in season from the middle of November to the end of 

 March ; after that time the fur is spoilt, and they are then 

 much tormented by fleas. The flesh of the loupcervier is 

 white and tender, and not bad eating. 



The pine marten, or sable (Mustela martes) is a very 

 shy and active little animal, and very rarely if ever seen 

 by the hunter. When hard pressed by a dog they tree. 



