Chapter XII: Front Matter (12)

The bob-white has become so rare that you will probably have to plant some seed birds, as they say. They can be bought for five to ten dollars a dozen. Care should be taken that the birds are not frightened when liberated. To spend ten dollars for birds, only to lose them by carelessness, is poor business. These suggestions are given by an experienced game warden: "Take the boxed birds out near some good, thick shelter where they can hide and gain confidence. Attach a long rope to a soap box, scatter grain about near the end of the box nearest the cover, and scatter sheaf grain along toward the cover. Take only three cocks and three hens from the shipping box and put them in the liberating box. Go some distance off and be deliberate. Let the quail get rested and quiet. Pull the long rope, lifting the box gently and steadily. The birds will see the grain and hop out. Watch them from your safe distance following the wheat toward the cover. Keep up the supply of wheat until they are accustomed to their new home, and can find their way back after roaming. Birds should not be planted later than May first."

PROTECTING THE WILD FLOWERS

The country would be a better place to live in the whole or part of the year or to visit for a day or a week or a month if there were more wild flowers there. Even the man who doesn't know one flower from another will acknowledge, if asked, that wild flowers make the woods and the roadsides and the meadows prettier to look at.

The country over, our loveliest wild flowers have met the same fate as the bright-feathered birds. They have been hunted for their blossoms and the gatherers have not cared whether they pulled the plants up by the roots or not. The case of trailing arbutus is a particularly sad one. In localities where it used to flourish, selfish and wanton hands have literally rooted it out until none remains.

Only lately has any effort been made to protect the wild flowers and multiply them. Now, in the general awakening of the public to the fact that we are blundering and wasteful, a widespread interest has grown up in saving the wild flowers.

In your own locality you can help this good work. Refrain from destroying the plants yourself. When you gather flowers in woods or meadow do so in moderation. A few loose, graceful sprays will give you as much pleasure as a huge bunch inartistically crowded into a vase. Have you not often seen children returning from a walk in the woods bearing handfuls of columbine? These frail blooms wilt in the hot sun, and the roadway is often strewn with forlorn bunches of them, dropped by tired children. How much better that each child should gather a few and put them all in a botanical case or wet paper to be distributed when they reach home. Those hundreds on the dusty road will never be visited by the ruby-throated humming-bird, nor set any seed for next year's flowers. Older boys and girls can do much to influence the younger ones to gather sparingly.

Another way to increase the wild flowers in your locality is to propagate them. Gather their seeds and plant them in your garden where you can protect the young seedlings from harm. Where they are big enough, set them out where they will have natural conditions. Or undertake a bit of wild gardening right in the woods or the roadside where the plants grow naturally. Clear out less desirable sorts, lessening the struggle for your favourites. Cultivate them a little. See that they do not suffer from too much sun or rain or drought.

If you know of a plot of woodland soon to be denuded or a piece of wild land to be improved, get permission to gather bulbs, roots, and plants there. If you know the flowers the year 'round, you will be able to recognize the lilies, the orchids, the blood roots, the wild ginger, hepatica, violets, and can transplant them to your own woods or garden.

PREVENTING FOREST FIRES

It is October now, and this morning's paper had accounts of terrible forest fires raging in Minnesota. Hundreds dead, thousands homeless, and millions of dollars' worth of property wiped out.

Nobody knows, who has not fought fire, what a fiend the foresters have to deal with. I have looked up many forest fire statistics and I find always noted among the "sources of fires," this item: _Forest Fires Set By Children_. There may not be much that boys and girls can _do_ to put in practice the big things we hear talked about under the name of conservation, but one thing you can certainly refrain from doing, and that is, setting a forest fire. A person who makes a fire in the woods is responsible to the community for that fire and its consequences. To boil a coffee pail, to broil bacon, to bake biscuits, to fry fish, to give comfort to the hunter, trapper, camper, or picnicker, many are the legitimate uses of a fire in the woods. No real sportsman forgets his fire. His last act before leaving a camp is to see that no vestige of it remains. He makes sure every spark is dead, then throws on another pail of water, and goes on with a light heart and a clear conscience. If you have ever left a fire in the woods, anywhere, your conscience ought to give you a good jab when you read of forest fires, though distant, a jab that will prevent your repeating the offence.

KILLING WEEDS

Weeding is the boy's job, isn't it? If only one could get some kind of inspiration into weeding, so as to rob the work of its drudgery!

If we must serve our time at weeding, let us at least weed intelligently. What is a weed anyhow? In Germany, I am told, the peasants call weeds "_Unkraut_". Since "_Kraut_" is cabbage, "_Unkraut_" must be weeds.

A weed is really a plant growing where we don't want it. The worst weed in a hill of four corn stalks is the fourth stalk of corn that crowds the others. The worst weeds in a row of beets are the little beet plants that crowd each other. What a plague they are!

Some of the plants we usually include among our "coarse native weeds" are grown in gardens in Europe. Mullein, for example, over there is called "the American velvet plant" and a well-grown specimen is really handsome.

If weeds are plants out of place there is much to be done by boys and girls in the way of ridding gardens, lawns, school grounds, and village streets of their overgrowth of weeds. If you clear out one thing put in something better or nature may put in some plant that will not please you. Save seeds from your own garden and drop them along the roadside.

The school grounds are the particular province of the school boys and girls. Join together to make the grounds more beautiful and there is no end to the improvements that will follow.

A lecturer once visited the school in a small village in the state of New York. On his way from the village to the school-house he was impressed with two things: first, the wonderful size and vigour of the burdocks that seemed to have possession of even the front yards on the business streets; and, second, the quantity of rubbish accumulated on the margin of the pretty little stream which wandered under the bridges of the town. Do boys and girls know what public spirit is? Do you know how your little village strikes a stranger? The lecturer was so struck by the sad state of the town that he made up his mind to talk to the school about it. He did. He found that public spirit was not dead there; it was only dormant. The boys and girls had passed by the burdocks so often during their growth that they had taken them for granted. They had so often thrown papers, broken dishes, worn-out baskets, barrels, and rubbish over the bridges that they forgot to notice how it looked. What else is an old creek like that good for anyhow? Can't go swimmin' in it.

Before the man finished his sociable little talk with the boys and girls he had organized the younger ones into brigades of twenty to make war on the burdocks. With the help of teachers and boys he mapped out the town and assigned given localities to certain groups. Each group had a captain with orders. The lecturer had a burdock plant brought in, a tremendous one, root and all, from the school yard. He showed the boys and girls how well adapted this weed is to make a living, how by means of burs it steals rides, travelling from place to place, dropping a few seeds here and a few there. He showed them the tough, long root and told them the plant's life history. Has the burdock any vulnerable spot they wondered? The only time when burdock is weak is when it comes up as a seedling. One scrape of the hoe would kill hundreds then.

Hearing what was up at school, an enterprising business man offered to give ten dollars to the squad of pupils who brought in the largest number of burdock plants. This added zest to the work and a generous emulation. Before the week was up, the town was rid of burdocks, and there were wagon loads of them withering on the vacant lot near the school. The squad that won the prize brought in upwards of seven hundred plants, root and branch. They donated the money to the school library.

The boys and girls in that village didn't need to be waked up but once. They went to work on the little stream. They had bonfires at the water's edge. They planted willows and other water loving trees on the banks, they asked the selectmen to pass a law to forbid the throwing of rubbish and sewage into the stream. They enforced the law themselves. Then they built two little dams, and made a skating pond right near the school house.

GETTING RID OF POISON IVY

If there is any one thing that would make the country a better place to live in for some people, it would be to eradicate poison ivy. When it once gets possession of a fence row, it is an awful job to get it out. Cutting off the tops is about as effectual as cutting your hair. It grows again thicker than ever. The roots and the creeping stems run under ground and every cubic inch of soil has to be gone over.

A great many beautiful plants will have to be destroyed in our fence rows in getting out the poison ivy. But we can replace these, and by constant watchfulness keep the ivy out.

In some localities the village selectmen have seriously undertaken the eradication. Any one who has ever suffered will agree that the work ought to be taken hold of in a public way. Many people are immune. Those who know themselves to be so should undertake the work. A bounty is offered by some towns for uprooted plants.

The hands should be washed frequently with hot water and plenty of soap when working on poison ivy. Washable overalls and shirt should be worn, as the oil of the ivy gets on the garments and may poison any one who handles them.

LESSENING THE PLAGUE OF MOSQUITOES

Every boy and girl in the "mosquito belt" realizes keenly that the towns as well as the country would be better places to live in if there were no mosquitoes.

Some people do not believe that it is possible to lessen this plague, much less end it. But such a belief is pure ignorance. I know of an army post where in one season the mosquitoes were eradicated. It was easy there, because the post was isolated and because, when the commandant issued a general order that all rain barrels were to be covered or emptied, the people went right out and obeyed. You see, army people get a fixed habit of obedience. Then the health officer, who really had the matter most at heart, though backed by his superior, had squads of prisoners at work gathering up and carting off tin cans or other rubbish capable of holding water. Pools were drained. Sewer openings and ponds were oiled. Before the mosquitoes had fairly got out of winter quarters all the stagnant water was coated with an oil film. There was no use trying to lay eggs under those conditions, so they left for parts unknown. As mosquitoes cannot fly far unless carried by the wind, they undoubtedly perished just outside the gates, and the people came out and sat on their porches safe and happy. They were ashamed that they had grumbled when the orders came to cover the rain water barrels.

Mosquitoes breed in water. The wigglers of the watering trough or rain barrel are young mosquitoes. You can raise your own mosquitoes as well as your own chickens and pigs. A little precaution would save much annoyance. Neighbourhoods should unite to rid themselves of the pest. Boys can do the work required. The school children in Worcester, Mass., wage very effective war against mosquitoes every year under the guidance of their teachers. The saving in cost of netting and wire screens would almost pay the expense of a campaign against mosquitoes and flies.

After emptying or covering all the water receptacles on the place, it is well to place a few decoy pails in promising situations. When the mosquitoes have deposited their eggs, tip over the pails and that is the end of that lot. One female can produce four hundred eggs, so you see what a calamity it is for her young to come to maturity, which they may do in eight to ten days.

Mosquitoes have their natural enemies. Where areas of water are too large to oil, we should see to it that fish are plentiful, especially goldfish, sunfish, roaches, killies, and minnows. Toads, frogs, and lizards also prey on mosquitoes as do the nymphs of dragon flies and other water insects. Swallows and purple martins catch mosquitoes on the wing.

FIGHTING FLIES

The house fly is no longer a mere nuisance, but is a menace to health. He is well named the typhoid fly and the filth fly. The boys and girls who help rid their neighbourhood of these disease-carrying pests are real patriots.

Flies are not a heaven-sent plague in this day and generation. Flies in the milk, flies in the pantry, flies on the kitchen door, flies buzzing about the table, are the obvious result of carelessness and mismanagement. What is more, the remedies are not hard to apply. The typhoid fly (house fly) breeds in horse manure. The adult fly feeds upon every known variety of filth as well as upon good food, but the undeveloped fly is a footless maggot and it breeds in your own and your neighbour's stable yard.

People will go on buying fly paper, fly poison, fly traps, screen doors, and window netting to keep flies out, but the very fly that has visited a typhoid patient to-day may to-morrow leave the imprint of his foul feet on the baby's face, or drown himself, but not his germs, in your gravy.

What does your father have a manure pile for? If he is a frugal farmer he expects to put it on his fields when the other work is out of the way, and plough it in. He knows the value of manure on fields. But does he realize that the best time to carry the manure out is while it is new? Every expert will tell him so and why. In the pile by the barn it lies and burns. Have you seen it smoke? Burnt manure is wasted fertilizer. When it rains, the valuable elements needed by the soil leach out and nourish the crop of "jimson weeds" and burdocks that will crowd round the barn yard next year.

Meantime the flies buzz round the manure pile. The worse it smells the better they like it. They are there for business. Eggs, thousands upon thousands of tiny flies' eggs, are deposited by industrious and prolific flies. A fly's egg! The hired man will laugh at you for bothering over a thing so insignificant. But when his wife comes down with typhoid and the flies come in and worry her, he will complain of his luck and drive out the flies, which go merrily forth to start little private epidemics all over the neighbourhood.

Destroy their breeding places. That is one remedy for flies. Trap them, poison them, discourage them.

Is it worth while for you to do this when the rest of the people do not? Yes, indeed. If you have very near neighbours, their flies may get to you to some extent, but with nothing to furnish breeding places, and no foul-smelling swill or decaying animal or vegetable stuff around, they will not be attracted to your place. Awaken the neighbour's interest in your "fly-destroying crusade." If you can reach results best by forming a club, organize and pass resolutions and wake people up to their responsibilities. This is practical work for a boys' good citizenship club.

TRAPPING

I know a city boy who is fortunate enough to have a farm home to go to as soon as school closes in the summer. With his parents and brothers and sisters he lives the life of the farm boy, with enough of gardening, a little of chicken raising, one cow to milk, and a chance to measure his cunning against that of many "varmints" which would otherwise destroy his garden and steal his chickens. He knows how to use a gun, and when, and where. He can make a good trap, a scientific and humane trap, and he knows the ways of the two-or four-or six-footed enemies he is at war with. Between them and him there is a fair field and no favours, just as between one wild creature and another. If to-day he outwits a crow, to-morrow a skunk pays the crow's score with heavy interest by making a meal of a nestful of young chickens.

This boy has learned enough of the art of preparing skins to make those he gets salable, and he exhibits with just pride a handsome fur skating cap made by his mother out of skins of mink he has taken. His traps add something every year to his growing college fund.

There are a great many things about the business of trapping that seem very horrible and brutal to a sensitive person. Because many cruel men have gone into that life, which is a life of the greatest hardship and has little in it to encourage gentleness, we have rather taken it for granted that all trapping is unjustifiable and that a boy who wants to set traps is an inhuman monster and not to be tolerated in a civilized home. If fathers and mothers were all like my young friend's parents, they would see that trapping ought to be a part of a boy's training, just like using an axe, or a saw, or a gun.

Trapping everything would be bad business. You would not catch squirrels in a trap any more than you would shoot bluebirds or brown thrashers. One could easily damage his neighbourhood and himself by trapping the wrong things or trapping in the wrong way. A trapper who is a sportsman will see to it that his traps are of the right kind. I would not have a mouse-trap in the house that made a practice of catching mice by the foot or tail. There are traps of many kinds for a variety of purposes and the trapper must either catch his prey alive and provide a way of despatching it humanely or use a trap which is instantaneous in its deadly work.

Boys who have learned to trap in the natural, legitimate way do not become "fish butchers" or "game hogs" when they grow up. I once saw a picture of a game warden standing triumphantly beside a mound of dead crows, two thousand and twelve was the number, I believe. He had cunningly learned to imitate their call so successfully that they could not resist coming within range of his deadly weapon. Crows may be harmful to wild fowl but no boy with right instincts would be guilty of an act so base as this, so unbecoming a sportsman and a gentleman.

Getting rid of the animals which prey upon orchard, garden, and chicken roost is, without question, one of the ways of making the country a better place to live in. Trapping may be regarded as clean sport when done for this purpose, or for food when needed. Catching animals alive for the sake of taming and training them as pets is treated in another chapter and has its own rules.

There are a number of fur-bearing animals which, though too shy to venture inside the barn yard, prey so successfully upon the less fortunate ones, that it has become our duty to take up warfare against them. This duty is all the more heavily laid upon us because, in the act of civilizing the woods and converting the hills and valleys into cultivated fields and pastures, we have destroyed the natural hiding places of the wild things and "upset the balance." If we were suddenly to abandon this country, it would not be many generations before the buffalo, the wild pigeon, and the wild turkey would return to their haunts, the forests would recover the hills, the potato beetle would go back to its Colorado weed, and some natural enemy would control the San José scale and the English sparrow and reduce them to their natural places.

In some localities trapping of fur-bearing animals is still a money-making small industry and if properly carried on will lead to no evil results. The more a boy knows about the habits of the animals he seeks to outwit, the greater will be his chances of a capture, and when he knows a little he will want to know more. He will learn that there are rules in this game as well as in games with his human fellows, and that there are things "that no man would do," and pretend to self-respect. A knowledge of woodcraft is indispensable to the trapper and helps him to take care of himself and act with good judgment in cases of emergency.

A boy that sets a trap takes a certain responsibility. If he fails to visit his traps he breaks a rule of the game. A live animal in a cage trap begins to suffer very soon for water and for food. An animal in a steel trap, if not dead, will often pull or even gnaw off his injured leg, and escape. His tragic story may often be read in his footprints in the snow. If trapping for skins you must take them off while fresh, as they taint very quickly and may be ruined by delay.

TRAPPING MINK

The boy that catches a mink is a pretty lucky boy in these days when those wily little robbers have grown so scarce. The price of mink fur made into muffs and collars is so high as to make a mink skin worth trying for. I can imagine the surprise and well-earned triumph of my young trapping friend when, after trying for a year or two to solve the mystery of the disappearance of his thoroughbred chickens, he finally succeeded in capturing a fine mink. A friend of his to whom he had taught all he could of the art of trapping caught another. And this happened within the city limits of the nation's capital! Who says now that the mink has disappeared?

The mink is a flesh-eater, and lives on what he can catch, varying his bill of fare with frogs, snakes, birds, mice, muskrats, and fish. It is always open season for trout in the mink's code of laws and though he is not a water animal his home is more than likely to be near a trout stream, on the bank, in a well-concealed place. It is not fair to trap mink in the breeding season, which is April or May. The young are at the mercy of all sorts of flesh-eaters, including their own fathers, who are a most undiscriminating sort. There ought to be some form of guarantee to a mink mother that while she is foraging for food for her young she will not be enticed into a trap. Later, when she goes a-hunting on her own account and the chances are even, she is legitimate prey for the trapper.

Steel traps are best, say the experts, and they should be cunningly concealed. Gouge out a sort of hole in the bank, conceal the trap at the front, and put the bait farther in so that the trap must be passed to reach the bait. Muskrat flesh, fish, or other meat is the bait used. A common practice is to scorch the bait, to make the odour more pervasive and attractive. The price of fresh mink skins varies according to size and condition from two dollars and a half to four dollars.

TRAPPING SKUNKS

The last thing you would expect of a skunk is that he should be popular among the girls. But under the seductive title of Alaska sable, the fur of the plain Jersey or York State skunk is worn with satisfaction by ladies of good sense and good taste. A skunk's pelt is worth two dollars and a half or more and although he is of undoubted value to the farmer as a destroyer of insect pests, I shall not undertake his defence. A cloud of witnesses would rise up to recount their losses from the marauding skunk. His fondness for poultry would be mere circumstantial evidence that he is an enemy of the wild birds as well, but we have direct evidence enough to convict and condemn him. Because of his unusual weapon, used only when hard-pressed in an unequal battle, a good deal of special precaution has to be taken when trapping _Mephitis_ for his fur. The least taint of the unmistakable odour ruins the skin, as no cleansing compound has been invented strong enough to remove it or drown it. It is said on good authority that the skunk seldom besprinkles itself when discharging its "rear battery."

Skunks are not very clever nor very swift. They go about at night for the most part, or early evening. The young are born, six to nine in a litter, in April or May. The nests are hidden in holes in hollow trees, among rocks, or in the ground. The young ones frequently follow the old ones all summer or even longer, little realizing that this is a dangerous habit. By tracking them from the scene of their nocturnal visit to or from the stream they run to daily for water, one may find the hiding place. A clever trapper succeeds in capturing a whole family ofttimes by simply making the path the skunks follow more distinct, treading down the grass, and even setting up sticks to guide them along toward the place they wish to go. Traps with bits of meat for bait are set at intervals along the path. A snare and spring pole are said to insure no bad consequences. One author advises the hunter that striking a sudden blow near the tail paralyzes the ejecting muscles. No doubt! But in the meantime what is the skunk doing?

The white stripe on the skunk's back, while a valuable warning to all of what is approaching, is a disadvantage from the trapper's viewpoint. This stripe varies in length and some varieties are without it entirely. There is a story of the days when the Indians in western New York used to bring in many skunk skins to the local fur-buyer. One red man, a notorious cheat, came in one day with a single skin to sell.

"Long stripe or short stripe," said the buyer, whose prices varied with the length of the white stripe on the skunk's back.

"Ver' short stripe. How much pay?" said the Indian.

"Let's see the skin," said the buyer.

The Indian showed the skin, which was that of a young animal, and very small, the stripe extending the entire length of the skin.

"You said short stripe," said the indignant buyer, pointing the finger of scorn at the runty little skin.

"Short skunk, short stripe," said the Indian with a shrug. "What you pay?"

I cut out an item from the daily paper last week which had this headline: "Skunks sent him to college." Can you draw your own inferences? The fur of skunks is very valuable now and in many fashionable Paris shops it is advertised with large placards printed distinctly for their English-speaking customers, "_Veritable Skong_."

TRAPPING WOODCHUCKS

Judging by the tales they tell, New England boys of the passing generation spent most of their time trying to outwit the woodchucks which infested their farms. If all their tales were true, the barn doors of their respective states must have needed stretching to hold all the skins of all those woodchucks, and no boy could possibly have been long without that valuable possession, a whiplash made of woodchuck hide. This little cousin of the squirrels is neither very fleet nor very cunning. He has, though, very quick ears and quicker eyes, and knows that his hole is the safest place for him when boys are around.

The only excuse for hunting woodchucks is that they sometimes get so numerous as to do real damage in the garden, either by their holes and the mounds of earth they throw out, or by eating more vegetables than can reasonably be spared. A better game than hunting them would be to discover how they build their underground galleries. Are these mere holes deep enough to crawl into for safety? Is there more than one tunnel? Has the owner an exit as well as an entrance to his home? Has he a nest, and where and what is it? Does he hoard for winter, or hibernate?

TRAPPING MOLES

It is hard to get a new point of view. Having been brought up in the belief that the mole is a nuisance, pure and simple, I find myself unable on short notice to believe that this little blind miner is actually useful. If only he would confine his sphere of usefulness to some other neighbourhood than our lawn! We all think that his underground passages disfigure the lawn. But does the grass die where the tunnels run? I think not. You see patches of dead grass on many lawns, but do you find moles at work in these same lawns? In fact, the brown, dead patches of grass are probably killed by the white grub, arch enemy of grass roots. The mole is arch enemy to the white grub and others of his ilk. According to people who know about moles, we ought to decorate them with medals instead of trapping them and decorating the barn door with their tiny skins.

The first mole I ever saw was one brought in by our old cat. She laid it down with a sort of shamefaced air as much as to say, "Things have come to a pretty pass when a self-respecting cat is obliged to bring in the likes of that. It fair turns my stomach!" It was not an attractive object, but we children turned it over and over with a stick. What an odd shape, so unlike the animals familiar to us. Its nose like a gimlet, its fore feet like little shovels; no wonder it could tunnel. No eyes, no ears; but what use has a mole for either? Do you know what Oliver Herford said of the mole?

"See, children, the misguided mole,
He lives down in a deep, dark hole;
Sweetness and light and good fresh air
Are things for which he does not care.
But say not that he has no soul,
Lest haply we misjudge the mole."

No one can say that the mole has not a redeeming feature. Surely there is no creature clad in a coat of more surpassing softness and fineness than the mole. Are the exquisite "moleskin" garments sometimes seen in furriers' windows really made of tiny skins of this despised little quadruped?

It is not likely that any of us will ever catch many moles. If they are troublesome in your lawn, you and the neighbour boys can do some trapping with mole traps. They are of a kind specially fitted to outwit the mole in his tunnel, and directions accompany each trap.

Every boy knows what "knuckle down" means and how sore your knuckles get in marble time. There is usually one boy in the crowd who is lucky enough to have a knuckle dabster, made of moleskin. "There, use that. Soft as velvet, eh? Nope, don't want to sell it. Caught a mole last summer, tanned the skin myself and my mother made this for me, like the one in 'The Boy's Own Book.' Wouldn't take a dollar for it."

TRAPPING MUSKRATS

The first fur collar I ever had was sold to me as "electric seal." There was no deception practised on me, for I knew that the fur was neither electric nor seal. But I didn't know then that it was muskrat fur. They call it Hudson seal nowadays, I believe. These small relatives of the beaver have so few natural enemies, and are so prolific that they are in no danger of disappearing from our ponds and sluggish streams. The beaver, on the other hand, is supposed to be protected by law. Until it is against the law to sell and to wear beaver skins, trappers will evade the law and escape the fines.

Muskrat fur is not so fine nor thick as that of the beaver and not nearly so expensive. A fresh skin is worth twenty-five to forty cents. They are more in demand now than ever, owing to the fashionable demand for furs and the scarcity of other fur-bearing animals. There are many ways of trapping them. As they are aquatic and active in the winter they are often taken through the ice. Muskrat trappers are always good skaters. A hard blow on the ice will stun the rat, which is pulled out through a hole. They are sometimes speared through holes in the ice. A boy might develop enough patience and perseverance, as well as skill and alertness, in a job like this to make it pay better in some other field than the sale of the skins.

Muskrats are often caught in traps, too. To be successful at this it is necessary to learn a great deal about the little fellow's habits of life, his house, his food and his ways of escaping enemies. It is well to know his enemies, too. These are the fox, the mink, and the otter. You would be a lucky boy, indeed, if instead of common little musquash you bagged an otter whose pelt is worth fifteen or twenty dollars. My father has an otter skin cap about which he and my uncle tell a truly exciting story. They caught an otter, but that was sixty odd years ago.

Muskrats are the greatest nuisance in ornamental grounds where there are large water features. They have an unfortunate fondness for lily bulbs. The boy who can outwit them will win favour with the gardener and the garden's owner, with the muskrat skins thrown in.

TRAPPING GOPHERS

Our old dog Nimp was convinced that the way to get a gopher was to dig him out. Doctor Hornaday tells an amusing story about his having that same conviction when a boy. Many a night Nimp would come home from the pasture, panting, his coat all rough with the reddish soil that we knew had come out of a gopher hole. Weary, yes, but discouraged, never. The old dog would go back to his job morning after morning. Sometimes we would try to help by carrying buckets full of water and "drowning him out." Never did Nimp scent a gopher near the cattle well but once, and then the boys drowned him out with a vengeance. The hunted little creature leaped out of a hole so unexpectedly near where the boys sat that one turned a complete somersault and landed in the last pailful of water. Nimp was quicker than his masters and soon laid the bedraggled little miner at our feet. We felt pretty small.

Very little can be said in defence of the gopher. He is an undeniable nuisance and helps to bring the farmer's crop down to a lower figure than it ought to be. Traps and poisoned vegetables are swifter methods of dealing with the case than digging, for the gopher is himself past master in the art of digging.

TRAPPING THE WEASEL

One of the natural enemies of the pocket gopher is the weasel. If only we could set the weasel on the gopher and then had something like a mongoose to keep down the weasels! I never yet heard a good word for the weasel. He seems to be the embodiment of all that is mean and sly and hateful. It is undeniable that he does not obey the laws of the woods, that he kills for the mere joy of killing, and that is a high crime. Men with weasel-like ways get to have the same blood-thirsty look. The weasel is a savage, hunting every wild creature in the woods, rabbits, mice, chipmunks, moles, rats, grouse, chickens, and ducks, and even insects. He robs the nests of birds, eats eggs and young, and even the old birds are not safe from him.

I just read in a book that "weasels are so small that their fur has little value, but the time will come when it will be eagerly sought and used." Well, that time has come, but, who ever went to a shop and asked for a weasel tippet? But ask for ermine and they will show any quantity of it. The price! Well, wouldn't the weasel be surprised to find himself so popular. It all comes about because of that interesting habit of his, changing colour in the winter. The weasel is a sort of peculiar shade of brown as you can testify if you have caught one; the ermine is pure white all but the tippest tip of the tail which is dead black; yet they are one and the same. Weasel in summer and ermine in winter.

The weasel, the mink, and the marten are all enemies of the native wild game, and efforts to exterminate them are always applauded by sportsmen. Much is yet to be learned of their habits. Trappers have succeeded in keeping the mink and marten in check, but the weasel goes his murderous way, feared and hated by everybody.

TRAPPING RATS

There is no pest around the farm yard or barn yard anywhere so hard to cope with when once they get a foothold, as rats. Finding them numerous in the barn once, we put chicken feed in the uncemented cellar of the house. Before the end of the first winter of that arrangement we were praying for a visit from the Pied Piper. The rats took possession. They broke dishes, seemingly for the fun of it; they gnawed the softened woodwork around the kitchen sink and held high carnival at midnight throughout the spaces between the walls; they all but bit the babies in their cradles and defied all our efforts to outwit them. Traps, cats, poison, we tried everything, but they outstayed us. If ever we get into a like case again I shall be tempted to try ferrets or cyanide.

Some people are successful trappers of rats, and these suggestions come from them. Set a trap in a pan of meal or bran, cover with same and put it in a runway. Make the runway easy to pass through by placing boards or boxes along near the walls. Cover a trap with thin brown paper or cloth and set it in the runway. Smoke the trap over the fire and heat it hot (not hot enough to draw the temper of the steel), after each setting. Change the place of the trap very often. Wear gloves to keep the odour of your hands from the trap. The rat is the very wisest of all his family, his behaviour seems to be the result of impish intelligence rather than mere instinct for self-preservation.

No true sportsman will allow his antipathy to rats or weasels to lead him to commit acts of cruelty. Fighting them with their own methods makes you into a human rat or weasel.

TRAPPING RABBITS

There are times when rabbits get too numerous, and times when they are needed to eat, and times when you want to try your hand at taming a wild one. Under these circumstances it is legitimate sport to hunt or trap them. If damage is being done to crops in the spring we shall be forced to wage war against them in self-defence during their breeding season. Otherwise no sportsman would do it. If there is so little legitimate rabbit food in winter that they are driven to destroy fruit trees to get a little bark, then the inference is that there are too many rabbits. Study the rabbit's ways of living, and learn his weak points. Find out if he has a "tendon of Achilles" or vulnerable spot. Look one over. What are his conspicuous characteristics? Is it not evident that his life is one long series of narrow escapes? He has few, if any, wits; how low his forehead. Timid eyes. But ears! Can he not hear you coming a mile off? And LEGS! Did you ever see a greater development in that direction? Yes, in a grasshopper, but nowhere else. The rabbit is a perfect mammalian grasshopper. When you stop to think of it you will see a certain pathetic side to its life.

The rabbit has its wild enemies, ever watchful, ever close on its trail. The hawk, the mink, the weasel, the fox, the lynx, and others are rabbit hunters. Besides his quick hearing, and his swiftness, Br'er Rabbit has a wonderful power of becoming invisible. His nondescript colour, combined with his ability to "freeze," serve him as well as a cloak of darkness. The cotton-tail rabbit is commonest in the Middle and Southern states, while his bigger cousin, the varying hare, overlaps the rabbit's territory in the colder parts, and takes his place in the most Northern states. The varying hare is called also the snow-shoe rabbit and the white hare, but in summer he is dull russet brown. You may have heard of the wonderful change of colour of this and other animals. Interesting stories are told of the sudden blanching of the fur, of its turning white, "in a single night," like the locks of the prisoner of Chillon. Not a word of truth in that story. Why do people, whose only fitness for telling stories lies in their having an imagination, make up such yarns about real things? They could invent an animal and then tell as many wonderful tales as they liked and nobody would be deceived. The truth about animals is wonderful enough. If writers would only take pains to find out the truth instead of repeating fancies!

Suppose the early ancestor of the white hare had a grayish-brownish coat, just the thing to protect him from his enemies in a world all full of grayish-brownish things. But one day there came a snow storm, and all the gray-brown things were covered with whiteness, except the poor hare. Suddenly he became the most noticeable object in the woods. Then all his neighbours saw him and wanted him, and mostly they got him.

It was about then that the hare began to be the "varying hare." A law of nature came to his rescue. Some hares there were which were not so dark coloured as others. They may have been longer winded and swifter footed, too, but anyhow they escaped and lived to bring families into the world. As like breeds like, these young hares took after their parents, and because they were lighter coloured in the winter they in turn escaped and carried this peculiarity into the next generation. It took endless years, and innumerable generations of hares, varying this way and that to fulfill this natural law, and fix the habit. But now that it is fixed we may well view it with wonder, and call it an example of the law of the "survival of the fittest." How is the change brought about? Just as the chickens and the birds moult, and the horse sheds, so do the rabbits. Their summer coats are thinner and brown. One by one the brown hairs fall out in the fall till finally the new coat is there, which is white. It is not like the human hair changing from brown to white. In the fall and then again in the spring there is a time when the varying hare is a variegated hare, his coat being mottled with white and brown.

Rabbits are hunted with dogs and their trails in the new snow are easily followed by the hunter alone. They are caught in traps and snares of various kinds. In one of his lessons in woodcraft, Mr. Seton describes a rabbit snare as follows: "String, a shoe-lace, a buckskin thong, or even a strip of clothing may be used as a snare. There are many ways of making a rabbit snare, but the simplest is the best. The essentials are, first, the snare--an ordinary running noose; second, a twitch-up--that is a branch bent down or a pole set in the crotch of a sapling. The snare is fast to the end of the pole, and spread open in a well worn runway. The loop is about four inches across and placed four inches from the ground. The pole twitch-up is held down by placing the cross-piece of the snare under some projecting snag. The rabbit bounding along, puts his head in the noose, the slight jerk frees the cross-piece from its holder, and in a moment the rabbit is dangling in air."

Rabbit fur is not very durable but is much used for the manufacture of less expensive fur garments. Under the name of "French seal" it finds a ready market and is really soft and pretty.

TRAPS THAT BOYS CAN MAKE

There are a number of traps and snares that boys can make. Descriptions of these are to be found in books on amateur carpentry, manual training, and books for boys of various kinds. The illustrations in this chapter are intended to give a few suggestions.

MONEY AND RECREATION IN TRAPPING

I shall not attempt to go at this subject from a professional side, as I think no boys care to trap for a living. Whatever may be said about the boy having a gun in a thickly settled suburb, nothing can be offered against his trapping if he goes at it in an amateur way and with no intent to exterminate the animals (which only a shrewd trapper could do).

I will presume the boy to be attending a neighbouring school either on the edge of a city or in a town. Under these circumstances he must attend to his traps early in the morning or after school. At first there may be no more than enough money in it to cover the cost of traps, but nevertheless the recreation which it offers will appeal to the average boy. As his knowledge of animals becomes greater with time, he will get more and more pocket money.

When he starts in, the other boys may laugh at him and say that there is nothing to trap. In most cases they would make a big mistake, because there often are, on the edge of a city, more fur-bearing animals than in the surrounding country. This for the reason that the professional trapper is not present and most of the city boys do not know how to trap. There are, say, muskrats and an occasional mink along the rivers and streams. The swamps usually abound in muskrats. In the woods and fields are squirrels, rabbits, raccoons, opossums, and (in the North) woodchucks.

It is legitimate to catch the water animals in ordinary steel traps because, if set right, the captive is instantly drowned. For dry land the steel jaw-trap is not suitable, because it will rarely kill the animal, but cause him much suffering as it usually breaks his leg. Often in such case the trapper will only find a foot in his trap, the animal having gnawed or twisted his body free. Nevertheless any trap is humane which kills the animal instantly. There are many new traps on the market which will do this, but on account of their being patented and high-priced they are not extensively used. The traps which are most commonly used for this purpose are the deadfalls and snares.

The muskrat lives wherever there is a body of water. He feeds chiefly on vegetable matter which he obtains in the swamps or digs on the banks, although he frequently visits a cornfield or vegetable garden. Only in cases of extreme hunger, as happens when they are frozen in, have they been known to eat their own kin. In swamps they have houses made of rushes and twigs, standing in a rounded shape about two feet above the water.

To trap in the swamps one must have high rubber boots and if the water is deep a small boat is necessary. A home-made flat-bottomed canoe, made of canvas, will be found to answer the purpose admirably. Where it is shallow enough to use the boots, a long, heavy staff should be carried, as the mud is very often treacherous and interwoven with muskrat runways. I might as well say in the beginning that the intending trapper should take a friend into his confidence and the two set out to trap together, for in this way they can help each other out of difficulties. (My friend had to do some pretty stiff pulling once to get me out of a mud hole into which I had recklessly plunged, having only in my mind to get to my traps quickly.)

Along the rivers the muskrats live in holes in the banks. In trapping in such places one may walk along the bank or use a boat, setting the traps in the entrances of houses or in the runs.

Before the trapping season begins it is very wise to go over the territory and locate the different houses, runways, and feeding places. This will save time when trapping begins, which should not be before December, because up to this time the pelts are not in their prime. The trapping season lasts for about three months or until the ice breaks up in the spring.

If the water is not yet iced over, the muskrats can be caught with the steel jaw-traps. They should be set in the runs or at the entrances of houses so that they are just under the surface of the water. The chain should be staked in the water as far out as possible. The muskrat will in every instance try to swim out into deep water and the weight of the trap on his foot will pull him down and drown him. Traps may be baited with apples, carrots, turnips, and nearly any vegetable or fruit. The bait should be stuck on a slanting stick so that it will hang about a foot above the pan of the trap.

When the water is frozen over, other methods must be followed. Many trappers cut the houses open and set the traps on the inside, but those who wish to keep the muskrats in the vicinity will not do this, because it destroys their homes and causes them to seek new shelter. For my own use I have "stop thief" traps which kill instantly and are not very expensive. A hole is cut in the ice and the trap set before the house entrance or in a swimway. In going through, the muskrat puts his foot on lever _a_, which releases _b_, and this in turn lets down lever _c_, which strikes him over the neck or back, breaking it instantly. As shown, the trap is fastened with staples to a wooden prong, one end of which is stuck in the mud at the bottom and the other fits just under the ice.