Indian Modes of Hunting – Setting Fox Traps

October 11th, 2023

Aug. 13, 1898 Forest and Stream, Pg. 125

Game Bag and Gun.

Indian Modes of Hunting.
III.—Foxes.

The fox as a rule is a most wily animal, and numerous are the stories of his cunning toward the Indian hunter with his steel traps.

Starvation makes them catch in deadfalls, but they must be very starved indeed before they pull a piece of frozen bait and have a weight fall on their back. The skins of foxes killed during starvation are never so valuable, as -the hair then lacks the rich gloss. When small game is plenty, such as rabbits and partridges, and foxes are few, the skins are of a deep richness not seen under other circumstances.

There are several different and distinct colors of foxes of the north country. They are all of the same family, with the single exception of the white or arctic fox. These, apart from their difference of color, differ very much” in their characteristics. They are not cunning; on the contrary, they are positively stupid. They will readily catch in deadfalls, and will walk into an open, uncovered steel trap in daylight! Again the flesh of the arctic fox is eaten as readily as that of the hare or white partridge; all other foxes are carrion; even a starving Indian would give them the go-by.

Of the other or true fox we have many colors and shades of color, and I give them in their cash value rotation, beginning with the black or pole fox: First, black or pole; second, black silver; third, silver gray; fourth, black cross; fifth, dark cross; sixth, ordinary cross; seventh, light cross; eighth, dark blue (i. e., lead color); ninth, light blue; tenth, bright red; eleventh, light red; twelfth, arctic white; thirteenth, pale red.

Number thirteen is the poorest quality of the fox family, and is worth less than the arctic white fox. January is the best month for trapping. First, because the fur is then at its primest, and second, food is harder to and the fox consequently more likely to enter a trap.

Of course any number of trap will catch a fox, but not every trap will hold him. There is such a thing as the trap being too large and strong, as well as too small and weak! When too large and strong it catches too high up the leg, and being too strong it breaks the bone at the same time; and then in cold weather it’s only a question of a few minutes for the frozen skin and muscles of the leg to be twisted off and Master Fox runs away on three legs, ever after to be too cunning to be caught in a trap. On the other hand, if the trap is too small and weak it catches the fox by the toe, and he either pulls his foot clear at once or the toes, be coming frozen and insensible to feeling, are twisted off; and this, if anything, is a harder fox to circumvent than the one with half a leg.

The proper trap to use is a Newhouse No. 2. When properly set it catches just above all the fingers, as it were, or where the paw or foot would correspond with the thick part of the hand. There there is a good, solid hold of muscles, sinews, etc. There, once the jaws are fixed, they hold the fox to the death.

Fox hunters are very particular to keep everything connected with the trapping away from the house or camp, even wearing an outside pair of moccasins, which are peeled off and hung up with the snowshoes.

The hunter generally places his trap or traps on some bare point jutting out into the lake, or some narrows, or near a clump of willows at the edge of barren grounds, or any other place his judgment tells him a fox is likely to pass. The fewer signs the better; therefore instead of the chain being tied to a picket, a stick 4 or 5ft. long is slipped through the ring on the chain up to the middle. Here it is securely fastened, so that it won’t slip either way. A trench the length of the stick is cut down in the snow with the head of the axe. and the pole laid therein about a foot beneath the surface. Snow is then piled in and the whole packed hard.

The trap is now opened, and the snow packed down with the back of the man’s mitt, large enough to lay the trap and spring therein. The trap is now open and about 2in. lower than the surrounding snow. The hunter now begins carefully to lay five flat balsam bows or clusters of needles from the palate out to the jaws until the whole is covered: then very gently he either dusts light snow over this until it has the same appearance as the rest or he takes up two large pieces of frozen snow and rubs them together over the trap until all is covered.

Chopped up frozen meat or fish, a supply of which the trapper is provided with, is now sprinkled or thrown about, beginning 15 or 20ft. off and gradually getting more plentiful as the trap is neared.

With a brush broom the hunter dusts his snowshoe tracks full as he recedes from the trap until he is off 30 or 40ft.: after that no further precaution is necessary for an ordinary fox. But for an extraordinary one I could relate a hundred different ways of setting traps and bait to overreach the wily old fellow: but in most cases it is time wasted, the fox eating the bait and turning the traps over night after night, much to the vexation of the hunter.

It is a pretty sight to see a black or silver gray fox jumping in a trap on the pure white snow. I went one time with Wa-sa-Kejic to see his traps in the barren grounds back of the post. I was following in his snowshoe tracks steadily, and we were just topping a small swell in the country, here and there clumps of black willows. All at once he stopped so suddenly in his tracks that I fell up against him.

“There,” he said, “look at that!” My eye followed his finger, and there, jumping and struggling to get away, was large black fox!

“Let me shoot him,” I exclaimed, drawing my gun cover as I spoke.

“Oh, no,” he replied, “we will only do that if he pulls himself clear of the trap.” And with that he drew his belt axe and walked with a steady step down on the fox. The closer he got the more the fox struggled, but he was well and freshly caught, and the trap held him fast.

Wa-sa-Kejic gave him a tap on the nose with the helve of the axe, which had the effect of stunning him. The Indian then seized him with his left hand by the throat, and with his right hand felt for his heart; this he drew gradually down toward the stomach until the heart strings gave way; there was a quiver, and the fox was thrown down on the snow limp and dead.

What a pleased look the Indian wore as he stood there, evidently oblivious to my presence for the moment, as he gazed down on the most valuable skin it was possible for him to trap. What a number of necessaries and luxuries this would procure for his family. He would get from the factor at the post $80 for that one single skin! What a number of any other skins it would take to amount to that sum!

Martin Hunter.

Indian Modes of Hunting – Setting Fox Traps

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