NELSON] 



TRAPS AND SNARES 



125 



bent stick, which flies up and draws the concealed noose taut about 

 the animal's body and holds it against the upper side of the cylinder 

 until it is strangled or the trapper comes to remove it. 



Among the people living to the south of the Yukon mouth thousands 

 of muskrats and minks are caught every fall and winter in small 

 wicker fish traps, such as are used for taking the blackfish {Dallia). 

 These traps are set in creeks and small rivers, beneath the ice, with 

 a close wicker or brush fence extending as wings from either side and 

 completely shutting off" the stream except at the opening occupied by 

 the funnel-shape mouth of the trap. In this way from ten to twenty 

 mink have been known to be taken in a single day. The traps are 

 completely submerged, and, of course, when the animals swim into 

 them they are unable to rise to the surface, and quickly drown. At 



Fig. 38— Marmot trap. 



times animals even as large as the land otter enter these traps and 

 are taken. 



The skins of minks, muskrats, and marmots are taken off", by a slit 

 between the hind legs, and dried on stretchers, with the flesh side out- 

 ward. The stretchers are made by fastening together two long, slender 

 sticks by means of crossbars, which permit them to be brought 

 together by a hinge-like motion and pushed into the inside of the skin ; 

 they are then spread, thus stretching the skin and holding it until it 

 is dry. This contrivance and the " figure-4 " dead-fall were probably 

 introduced by white men. 



Land otters and beavers are taken at their holes by means of steel 



traps. 



The hunting of fur-bearing animals of all descriptions commences 

 with the first heavy frost of autumn and continues until the short cold 

 days of midwinter.^ Then a period of cessation ensues until February, 



