Ground Vermin Catching Wild Cats. 311 



possible, feathered, is the kind to make use of, but 

 drawings and the like are not of much efficacy. It may 

 be necessary to mention, with regard to the setting of 

 the gin, that careful manipulation is most necessary, and 

 that the stake should be full sized and hold very tightly 

 when driven in ; otherwise, if a wild cat be caught, its great 

 strength and the plucky way in which it works to become 

 free will often release the ordinary stake ; even one which 

 may appear immovable soon becomes loose owing to the 

 lugging and wrenching it may receive ; and, further, the 

 spring must keep the jaws very tight, not necessarily 

 touching, but should certainly not allow more play than 

 a quarter of an inch. When one wild cat is caught it 

 is a good plan, likely to lead to the capture of one or 

 two more, to peg down the dead body on some small 

 open in the neighbourhood where the vermin have their 

 haunts, and to carefully set some five or six gins all 

 round it. Taking advantage of the habit wild cats have 

 of finding out dead of their kind, and walking round, and 

 even rolling on the carcase, one often succeeds in taking 

 one or more by means of this expedient. 



The other description of vermin cats are much more easily 

 dealt with than the real wild cat, and are comparatively 

 easily trapped. There is, however, of course, the usual 

 amount of care and trouble necessary, for these cats will 

 be found to be especially wary. Besides the ones which 

 may have taken to poaching as a permanent means for 

 support of life, there are many, very many, cats which, 

 while apparently strongly attached to the fireside during 

 daytime, and when their presence or otherwise, as the 



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