The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1888-02-02
How Indians Killed Deer.

The Co-Yukon Indians of Alaska
kill the moose in large numbers while
swimming across the Yukon river dur
ing their periodical migrations, "man-
euyering around IN their birch-bark
canoes until the animal is fatigued,
and then stealthily approach and stab
it in the heart or IONS" Another and
more ingenious mode OF capturing deer
adopted by these Indians is thus de-
scribed by Mr.. Whymper in his
travels in Alaska: "A kind OF
corral or Enclosure, elliptical in form,
and open at one end, is made on a
deer-trail. generally near the outlet of
a wood. The farther end of the inclosed
space is barricaded; the sides are built
of stakes, with slip-nooseS or loops be-
tween them. Herds of deer are
driven in from the woods, and. trying
to break from the trap, generally run
their heads into the nooses, tighten
them, and so get caught, or are shot
while still bewildered and running
from side to side. Near the opening it
is common to erect piles of snow with
'portheles' through which natives, hid
den. shoot at the passing deer"
We will notice lastly the ''deer-
fences of the once numerous and
powerful, but now extinct. Beothic
nation, the aboriginal inhabitants of
Newfoundland. They are thus de-
scribed by Mr.. Harvey in a recent IN
teresting book on Newfoundland:
''Tbe deer-fences were made by telling
the trees along the ridge of the rivers
bank without chopping the trunks
quite asunder, taking care that they
fell parallel with the river, each tree
having been guided SO as to coincide
with aud fall upon the last. Gaps
were filed up by drying in stakes and
Interviewing the branches and limbs of
other trees. They were raised to the
height of six or seven feet, as the place
required, and were not to be forced or
ieaped by the largest deer" 1t is in
teresting to notice that portions of
these deer-fences still remain in some
parts of the interior of Newfoundland,
principally, however, in those lying to
the northwest, the usual headquarters
of the Booths. The intrepid Cormack,
when travelling in Newfoundland, saw
those which lie on the bank of the river
Exploits, and in the narrative of his
expedition he thus refers to Them
"What arrests the attention most while
gliding down the stream is the extent
of the Indian fences to entrap deer
They extend from the lake downward
continuously on the banks of the river
at least thirty miles. There are OPEN
ings left here and there in them, for
the animals to go through and swim
across the river; and at these places
the Indians were stationed, to kill
them in the water with spears, out of
their canoes, as at the lake. Here,
then, connecting these fences with
those on the northwest side of the lake,
are at least forty miles of country,
easterly and westerly, prepared to in
tercept all the deer that pass that way
in their periodical migrations. 1t was
melancholy to contemplate the gigan-
tic yet feeble efforts of whole primi-
tive nation, in their anxiety to provide
subsistence forsaken and going to de-
cay. There must have been hundreds
of the red Indians, and that not many
years ago, to have kept up these fences
and pounds. - Chambers Journal.