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- Jun 2, 2007
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So, I've been reading a book about David Thompson's travels through North America in the late 1700's/early 1800's. Essentially, he was a surveyor who worked from the western shore of Hudson's Bay following the fur trade, and eventually wound up mapping the length of the Columbia River to the Pacific coast. I grew up on the river that bears his name, although he likely never set eyes on it. He was one of the earliest to document the techniques and lifestyle of the natives around the Foothills of the eastern Rockies (western Alberta) when the horse was still a novelty. He documented a couple of interesting trapping techniques I thought I'd share...
On catching eagles and hawks:
"...the natives made shallow pits which they covered in slender willows and grass under which they lay, with a large piece of meat opposite their breasts; thus arranged they patiently await the flight of the eagle, which is first seen very high, scaling in rude circles, but gradually lowering, till at length he seems determined to pounce upon the meat, his descent is then very swift, with claws extended, the moment he touches the meat the Indians grasp his two legs in his hands, and dashes him through the slender willows into the bottom of the pit and strikes his head until he is dead"
A rabbit snare as set across one of their runs in the snow:
"...across which a hedge is thrown of pine [spruce] trees of close branches, but cut away at the path; a long pole is tied to a tree, in such a manner that the butt end shall over-balance the upper end and the weight of the hare; to this [upper] end a snare of brass wire is tied by a piece of strong twine; this end of the pole is tied to the tree laid across the path by a slip knot, and the snare suspended four inches above the snow. The hare comes bounding along, enters the snare, the slip knot is undone, the top end is free, the butt end by its weight descends, and Puss is suspended by the snare about six to eight feet above the surface of the snow. This height is required to prevent them being taken by foxes and martens"
The book is David Thompson: Travels in Western North America 1784-1812, edited by Victor G. Hopwood. It's part naturalist, part travel diary and trade journal, part anthropology, and a good read IMO for anyone interested in paleolithic techniques (once you get past Thompson's sentence structure and unconventional use of punctuation, even for that time period).
On catching eagles and hawks:
"...the natives made shallow pits which they covered in slender willows and grass under which they lay, with a large piece of meat opposite their breasts; thus arranged they patiently await the flight of the eagle, which is first seen very high, scaling in rude circles, but gradually lowering, till at length he seems determined to pounce upon the meat, his descent is then very swift, with claws extended, the moment he touches the meat the Indians grasp his two legs in his hands, and dashes him through the slender willows into the bottom of the pit and strikes his head until he is dead"
A rabbit snare as set across one of their runs in the snow:
"...across which a hedge is thrown of pine [spruce] trees of close branches, but cut away at the path; a long pole is tied to a tree, in such a manner that the butt end shall over-balance the upper end and the weight of the hare; to this [upper] end a snare of brass wire is tied by a piece of strong twine; this end of the pole is tied to the tree laid across the path by a slip knot, and the snare suspended four inches above the snow. The hare comes bounding along, enters the snare, the slip knot is undone, the top end is free, the butt end by its weight descends, and Puss is suspended by the snare about six to eight feet above the surface of the snow. This height is required to prevent them being taken by foxes and martens"
The book is David Thompson: Travels in Western North America 1784-1812, edited by Victor G. Hopwood. It's part naturalist, part travel diary and trade journal, part anthropology, and a good read IMO for anyone interested in paleolithic techniques (once you get past Thompson's sentence structure and unconventional use of punctuation, even for that time period).
