Now step back and take dirt from the canvas and cover traps 1/2 or 5/8 inch deep; also cover your own tracks, and brush over all with a bush. If traps are well set it will be hard to tell where the traps lay. All dirt that is left on canvas should be taken away some distance and dropped. In using live bait proceed the same way with traps, only bait should be tied by the feet with a good stout cord and place a can of corn and one of water within reach of fowl, both cans to be set into the ground level with surface. Do not go nearer to traps than to see that they are not sprung and do not shoot or club game in the traps, but choke to death with a copper wire on the end of a pole; a good stout cord will answer the same purpose. Wipe all blood off traps before setting again and brush out your tracks as before, and above all, don't spit tobacco juice near your traps.
After catching one wolf or coyote, do not use more bait, as the scent is strong enough to draw all that comes near. I do not use any patent decoy or scents, as I consider them useless for any game. The only scent I use is what I make myself, and then only use it from February to April. In the summer I gather up four or five bitch dogs and as fast as they come in heat I kill them and take the organs of generation and pickle them in wide mouth bottles with alcohol enough to cover. I sprinkle a few drops on a stone or bush, stick in center between traps, but use no other bait. This is also good for fox.
The above method is the same as I learned it from an old Hudson Bay trapper, Pierre Deverany, who was born in 1817 and had trapped all through the British possessions and the Rocky Mountains, with whom I trapped for several years.
LYNX, FISHER, WILD CAT.
Here is the method for the capture of a lynx. Where lynx follow up trails, build a house around a tree, of brush, etc., leaving a small door fronting the trail. Cut a rabbit or bird and tie it to the tree in the house. Place a No. 4 or 14 Newhouse trap at the entrance, covering with cotton or wool and boughs. Fasten your trap chain to a clog; drag a rabbit up and down the trail past the house.
For a fisher build a small house and use No. 1 1/2 Newhouse trap and bait with rabbit, bits of deer meat with the hair and skin left on is also a good bait. Use a sliding pole or heavy drag, as the fisher sometimes chews the drag to pieces.
Wild cat are trapped about the same as lynx. There are a great many caught by making a cubby or enclosure where they cross or frequent in search of birds, rabbits, etc. The bait is placed back in the cubby and may be either bird, rabbit or fish.
The No. 1 1/2 and No. 2 Newhouse are used principally, altho the Victor No. 3 and Oneida Jump No. 4 are both adapted to wild cat trapping.