Trappers Laugh at "H. C. L."

1919

POINT A LA HACHE, La. — The high cost of living isn't worrying trappers along the lower coast. They are earning as much as $150 a week, because furs are bringing the highest prices ever known here. Muskrat pelts bring 90 cents each, and raccoon pelts $4. School boys who look after traps during their leisure hours are making about $3 a day.

Rats Lured Into Traps by Rodent Leader Who Acts as "Pied Piper"

1919

SHERMAN, Texas. — Sherman's Pied Piper, an aged, bewhiskered and tailless rodent, is no more. A frisky terrier, unaware of the importance of the tailless wonder, pounced upon him one day this week as he was leaving a trap where he had led hundreds of rats to their doom, and brought his useful career to an untimely end. And Sherman folks are sad. They feel like wearing mourning. Meanwhile rats which have infested the city have become "leery" of traps and are multiplying.

It was several weeks ago that the rat killing campaign was begun here. They were trapped by the hundreds. The killing was done by dogs assembled about the traps to pounce upon the captured rodents as they were turned out. One day what appeared to be the "daddy of all the rats" was found in one of the traps. One of the wise citizens suggested that this rodent's tail be amputated. He declared the old rat was the leader of the others and that his pride in leadership would make him leave the city. when his long tail was cropped off.

The operation was performed and the old rat turned loose, and admonished to leave the city.

But did he? Not much. The following morning the old rascal was found in one of the traps with forty others. The others were killed and the "leader" turned loose again. The following day he was back in the traps with more than a score of others. This continued from day to day. The people began to believe they would soon have the rats exterminated.

But the unusual happened. One morning this week in letting the captured rats out of a trap the "daddy" rat ran out with them. The terrier failed to recognize the "leader" and leaped upon him. Before any assistance could be given the old rat was killed. Since that time but few rats have been found in the big municipal rat trap.



Bullet Knocks His Hat Off

POTTSTOWN, Pa. — Only by the narrowest margin, John Stoudt, conductor on a trolley line, missed death when a bullet passed thru the number plate on his cap and knocked off his headgear. It is thought the bullet was fired by a would-be robber, who was scared off by the arrival of night-shift men.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Jan. 3, 1920, p. 5.

Catching Monkeys in South America

1900

The fondness of monkeys for mischief makes them the ready dupes of a shrewder intelligence. The manner of entrapping them is explained by a South American writer, who is familiar with life in town and in forest throughout the equatorial belt.

One of the simplest methods consists in cutting a number of holes in a gourd, making them barely large enough to admit the monkey's head. The gourd, thus prepared, is filled with corn and secured to the trunk of a tree. Then it is shaken violently, so as to attract the attention of the monkeys. A few grains of corn are scattered in the neighborhood of the trap.

The gourd is the dinner-bell of the monkeys. They no sooner hear the well-known sound than they descend from their aerial homes, and each in turn, seizing the gourd, grasps through one of the holes a handful of corn. Then they struggle in vain to withdraw their hands without relinquishing the prize. At this critical moment the concealed author of their mishap suddenly makes his appearance, and tying their hands, carries them off to his cabin in the woods. — Youth's Companion.

Fox Farming Proves Costly

1920

Pair Valued at $3,000 Escape; Trapper Kills One

GRASS VALLEY, Cal. — Fox farming in the Lake Tahoe region of the Sierras has proved a costly experiment and may end in failure.

Of three pair of silver-gray foxes brought from British Columbia early last winter to stock a farm projected there, two have escaped, one of them being killed recently by a trapper, and the other is at large.

The animals are said to be have cost $3,000 per pair at the place of purchase, and their pelts are valued at from $500 to $1,200.


To Exterminate Grasshoppers

To exterminate grasshoppers, a Wisconsin man has invented a device to be pushed across a field, the insects jumping against a policed metal surface from which they slide between rollers that crush them.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, March 27, 1920, page 2.

Trappers Prophesy a Long, Hard Winter

Michigan, 1919--

TRAPPERS PROPHESY LONG, HARD WINTER

THEY SAY NATURE HAS GIVEN ANIMALS ESPECIAL PROTECTION AGAINST COLD

Old heads in the trapping game go, each year, to the woods during the fall, to return before Thanksgiving time to tell the populace the character of the approaching weather. Their prophecy is based upon observation of nature's devices to protect her four footed charges from weather. No one doubts these prophets whose testimony is given below:

For weeks the beaver dams have been winter proof with the food supplies in. The dams this year are larger than formerly.

Bruin's coat is as glossy now as in mid-January. This means a cold winter sure, trappers say.

Immense flocks of geese have gone south. The north was deserted by them weeks ago.

Tree "cooties" are scarce and are nearer the ground than usual. Moss is heavier, bark is thicker, buds of trees are warmly encased.

Deer are herding early and all fur-bearing animals are a month nearer "prime."

--Ironwood Daily Globe, Ironwood, Michigan, November 20, 1919, page 13.

Student Trappers Coming to School with Smell of Skunks

1919--

PELT HUNTERS IN BAD

Nashville. Ind.—The skunks of central Indiana are on the point of breaking up the high school at Nashville. The school board has been called to sit on the situation, and, holding its nose, is expected shortly to hand down a ruling disposing of the skunks. It appears that the high school boys have found that skunk pelts are valuable, and all fall they have been conducting night hunts through the woods in search of the creatures. No one objected to their enterprise until they began to straggle into the schoolrooms of a morning with a reminiscent odor of the chase that demoralized the classrooms. Teachers stormed, but fragrant youth insisted on its right to go hunting. The matter was then put up to the school board for settlement.

--Ironwood Daily Globe, Ironwood, Michigan, November 20, 1919, page 7.

Motor-Drive Egg Beater

A small electric motor, which had become unfit for shop work, was used by one of the mechanics in his home kitchen, where it rendered good service in beating eggs, whipping cream, and even churning butter. He screwed it to the kitchen wall, with the drive shaft in a vertical position, and as this adjustment threw all the weight of the armature onto the lower thrust bearing, he placed two mica washers between the bearing and the shoulder of the armature. The power was transmitted to the egg beater by means of a collar, pinned permanently to the lower end of the shaft, and the top of the egg beater was thrust into the collar and held firmly with a thumbscrew, so that it revolved with the shaft. The beater was made from a piece of fairly coarse iron wire, twisted into spirals at its lower end, where it entered the dish or pan containing the eggs. To prevent the weight of the thumbscrew from causing the shaft to turn unevenly, a small lump of solder was used as a counterweight on the collar, opposite the screw. Several wire beaters were made and twisted into different shapes, so as to adapt the machine to the nature of the work which was to be done.

Mirror Bait for Raccoon Trap
To catch a raccoon without using edible bait, use a steel trap of medium size, with a mirror, or piece of tin foil, laid flat on the bait pan and secured in position with solder or wire. Set the trap, in water if possible, by some creek, or in some gully, where the tracks of a raccoon have been found. He is a very inquisitive animal, and when he sees light reflected from any surface, he is apt to paw it with his foot -- in this case to his own destruction. - J. W. Reynolds, Mason, Ill.

--Popular Mechanics, August 1919