A rabbit snare is made of fine babiche, sinew, cord, or wire, and the loop is hung over a rabbit runway just high enough to catch it round the neck. In its struggles it sets off the spring or tossing-pole, thus usually ending its sufferings. When thus caught the flesh is tender and sweet; but when caught by a leg the flesh is flabby and tasteless, the reason being that when caught by the neck the rabbit is killed almost instantly; but when snared by a leg it hangs struggling in pain for hours before it finally bleeds at the nose and dies, or is frozen to death. When the latter happens, however, the rabbit is usually thrown to a dog or used for trap bait. The reason Oo-koo-hoo set the rabbit snares was not so much for present needs as to provide meals for the hunter while on his future rounds; also to keep on hand a goodly supply of trap bait.
Expert hunters, when they have time, prefer to hunt rabbits by calling them. In the rutting season they imitate the love-call of the female, and in other seasons they mimic the cries of the young; in either case, the unsuspecting animals come loping from all directions, and the hunter bowls them over with fine shot. Calling takes much practice, but when the hunter has become an adept, it is the easiest and the quickest way of catching them.
In relation to setting snares for rabbits, Mrs. Wm. Cornwallis King, the wife of a well-known Hudson's Bay Company's chief trader, once had an unusual experience. She had set for rabbits a number of snares made of piano wire, and when visiting them one morning she was astonished and delighted, too, to find caught in one of her snares a beautiful silver fox; stranger still, the fox was caught by its tongue. As usual, after investigation, the snow told the whole story in a graphic way. It showed that the fox had been pursuing a rabbit, both going on the full run, and the latter always dodging in the effort to escape from its enemy. Finally, the rabbit had bolted past the snare, and the panting fox, with its tongue hanging out, following close behind, accidentally had touched its wet tongue against the wire, and the frost of many degrees below zero had instantly frozen it there. Then the fox, struggling to get free, had set off the snare, which closing on its tongue had hauled it into the air, where it had hung with just the tip of its tail and its hind toes resting on the snow. When Mrs. King found it, it was dead.
That evening, when the fire sank low and we turned in, a pack of timber wolves for fully an hour sang us a most interesting lullaby; such a one, indeed, that it made the goose-flesh run up and down our backs—or rather my back—just as really fine music always does; and to tell the truth, I enjoyed it more than many a human concert I have heard.
HUNTING THE LYNX
It was cool next morning and cloudy and threatening snow. Five rabbits had been caught during the night, and after breakfast we turned to setting lynx snares. The steel trap is set for the lynx much in the same way as it is for the fox; but for the lynx, a snare is preferable. It is set with or without a tossing-pole, at the entrance of a brush-lodge, the base of which is about five feet wide. The bait used is made by rubbing beaver castorum on a bit of rabbit skin placed in a split stick set vertically in the centre of the lodge. A surer way, however, is to also set a steel trap in front of the lodge door, so that if the lynx does not enter, he may be caught while looking in. The Indians often hunt them with dogs, for, when pursued, the lynx soon takes to a tree and then is easily shot. But the most proficient hunters like to hunt them by calling. They imitate its screech and also its whistle, for the lynx whistles somewhat like a jack-rabbit, though the sound is coarser and louder. Some Indians are very successful in this mode of hunting.
Besides being able to whistle, the lynx far surpasses the domestic cat in the range and volume of his evening song; and during the rutting season, at sunrise and sunset, he has a peculiar habit of beating or drumming with his forepaws on the hard snow or earth. No doubt it is a form of challenge, used much in the same way as the drumming of cock-grouse; martens and rabbits do the same. The lynx is a wonderful swimmer and is dangerous to tackle in the water, for he can turn with remarkable agility, and board a canoe in a moment. Of all northern animals he is perhaps the most silent walker, for in the night a band of five or six lynxes may pass close beside one's tent and never be heard, though a single rabbit, passing at the same distance, may make enough noise to awaken a sound sleeper. Though he often behaves like a coward, hunters approach him with care when he is caught in a steel trap, as he can make a great spring and when he chooses, can fight desperately. While in summer he is a poor runner, in winter he is greatly aided by his big feet, which act as snowshoes and help him over the soft snow and the deep drifts. Few animals succeed in killing him, for what with his unusual speed in water and the fact that he can climb a tree with almost the ease of a monkey, his chances of escape are always good.
