NEW ENGLAND TRAPPERS CATCH.
I have been waiting for some of the fox trappers of the Red River Valley, says a Minnesota trapper, to write and tell us how they manage to pinch Mr. Reynard's toes. I think we have a harder place here to trap fox than you Eastern fellows have. The country is just as level as a board and no timber, and we are liable to have a blizzard any hour. What makes it hard to trap is that the traps always blow in if you haven't got them in a good place. I have quite a trick to catch the fox, at least I have had the best luck with it. I first find a place where an old straw pile was burned, then smear my traps with blood and hide them good in ashes, erase all of my tracks and drop a few spirits of anise oil all around. For bait I generally use the entrails of a hog or beef. Last winter I caught two without any bait; just the oil. Last winter I had good luck with dead chickens. I always staple my traps to a clog of about twelve or fifteen pounds weight. On this clog I nailed the chicken and I got every fox that came around.
I only trapped one month with two traps, No. 2 Newhouse, and I got 6 fox and 1 wolf, and that was all the fox there were inside of about three or four miles, and I didn't have time to go further because I am a farmer and have my stock to tend.
If you know where there is a meadow with hay or straw stacked out on it, says Austin Palin, of Indiana, and if you will go to this stack after a little snow and there has been a fox in the field, he will be pretty sure to have gone to the stack to nose around. I first go and catch some fish about 6 or 8 inches long. I generally get suckers. I now clean my traps by boiling them in weak lye, then reboil them in evergreen boughs. I think it advisable to run beeswax over your trap, but I have had success without the beeswax.
After you have your traps cleaned and fixed do not handle them with your bare hands but put on a pair of gloves, take your trap and fish and a piece of wood about 4 feet long and the thickness of your arm and go to the stack. Now raise up the edge of the hay at the ground and slip the fish (one will be enough) back under the hay 6 or 8 inches, then set your trap directly in front of it, covering with the fine chaff; now fasten the trap chain to the piece of wood and slip the stick back under the stack, working it around a little so when the fox gets fast he can pull it out easily. Now take a stick and straighten out the hay over the trap and scratch out all signs and your set is complete. Make the above set when there is no snow.
We trapped foxes by baiting in beds mostly, says a Michigan trapper, though we caught five in the following manner: A wounded deer had fallen near two down trees which lap with tops crossed. We drew the deer into the apex or pen, as we noticed that foxes had been visiting the carcass. We cut notches out of these trees which were old and moss-covered, and set traps in the places prepared, covering neatly with moss.