TRAPPING

Earlier in this document I noted the lack of places to get a paying job in Pleasant Valley. The cattle ranchers hired people when they needed help which was mainly in the summer time. So when I came home at Christmas time in 1930 in the dead of winter there was no chance to get a job.

However, there was one thing a person could do to keep busy and to make a little money. That was trapping. Yes, trapping with steel jawed traps. Nearly everyone I knew did a little trapping each winter when the fur was heavy and there was nothing else to do. It required no great skill. You enticed a fox, coyote or raccoon into a trap, killed it and removed the pelt or skin. This was then put on a stretcher composed of two long sticks. The skin was stretched tightly and hung up to dry for a few weeks. It was then taken off and mailed to a fur company, most of which were in St. Louis, Mo. The fur company then mailed you a check. I do not recall exact prices but I think we could get one or two dollars for a fox and three to five dollars for a coyote.

Three of my friends were trapping during the winter of 1930 and they invited me to join them. I was only too glad to accept and brought along a few traps, a horse and a dog. I do not recall how I contributed for the food but I must have helped with the purchase of it. I was able to ride our horse, Tony, on this trip.

We started out in the high country and moved to lower altitude as the snow came. By the end of January we were camped at Blevins Trap on Copper Mountain near the JR Ranch. This was to the north of Roosevelt Lake in the Sierra Ancha Mountains. We had seventy five steel traps out and were averaging seven animals a night. Most of our catch was fox but there was an occasional coyote or a raccoon. Once in awhile we would find a skunk which was almost solid black so we would skin it.

We slept in a small tent and cooked on an open campfire. We turned our horses loose to find whatever food they could and we were glad when they did not stray very far from our camp. Among the horses was Hoggie about whom I have already written. He is the one who sat down off a fifty foot bank and was a victim of loco weed.

The weather was wonderful all through January but early in February it began to rain. We were not terribly uncomfortable since our beds were dry in the tent and we had plenty of fire wood. However, as the rain continued day after day we began to see trouble ahead. We had been out over a month and our food supply was dwindling fast. Venison had been a staple for a long time but the deer were scarce during heavy rain.

One day we were coming back to camp from a trap line and found some fresh deer tracks. Very quickly two of the guys volunteered to trail them and bring in some fresh meat. The other fellow and I continued on to camp where we stretched the new pelts and built a fire in anticipation of having fresh venison for dinner. In a surprisingly short time the two hunters came into camp carrying, not a leg of venison, but two quarters of beef.

Now I don't want to make this story a "True Confession" but we