Interview, 10/14

Douglas, Ben, and Renee met a farmer from Panton, whose family has six trapping boats, one of which is still used for fishing.

The family has been here for six generations, since the 1700s. The farmer started trapping in the 1960s on Dead Creek. A high-grade muskrat pelt was worth $1.25, and a low-grade pelt 35 cents. His father built the boats, and his grandfather probably trapped as well. He and his four brothers trapped, but he says, "Some of us kept it up more than others." His brothers also trapped for raccoon, fox, and beaver, but he only trapped for 'rats. Both he and his brother were licensed fur brokers, and his brother collected furs from Vermont and New York. A buyer from Massachusetts or New Jersey would then buy their furs for a fur house or as another middle man. He trapped in the fall as well as the spring, but you had to wait long enough for the animals to have their thick winter coats. They would trap after milking cows in the morning, and each had their own section of the creek. They would check traps until 2 or 3 pm, then do farm chores again, after which they would skin and flesh the hides.

He remembers there barely being a channel in Dead Creek in the 1960s due to all of the cattails. Their boats were double-ended so they could go either direction among the cattails. They also used push-poles, but some of the boats had oarlocks. Some boats were too narrow to be rowed. Occasionally, in big waves, they would paddle the boat kneeling and using both ends of the push-paddle like a kayak paddle. His poles were longer than the other we'd seen, perhaps 14 feet, and one paddle had tin on the sides of it as well. His father built a square-sterned boats for the younger boys so they wouldn't fall out - the square-sterned boat was less tippy. At the end of the trapping era, they used a canoe. He says a big decline in the market made trapping no longer worth it, though he trapped through 1995, "just for something to do." He says the muskrats go in cycles with water levels, diseases, and other factors. He speculates that climate change and herbicides, which kill cattails, may have caused the changes in Dead Creek. There are fewer cattails in Dead Creek now, which makes for more "bank 'rats," which live in holes in the bank instead of houses built of reeds.

They would often set traps at feed beds of cattails. The muskrats would swim along the bottom of the creek always in the same places, so they set their traps on the creek bottom. He remembers the bow and stern stems of the boats being oak, and the push-paddles ash because it is flexible and strong. Each brother owns one of the remaining boats, and his was built by his father in the 1960s when he was still in high school. The square-sterned boat was built in the 1950s. In 1969, he got 215 'rats: 91 were sold for $1.65, 105 at 82 cents, and 8 at 35 cents. His income from muskrats that year was $239. Their family trapped 6,000-7,000 'rats one year, and when his brother was working as a fur broker, they had 24,000 'rats from New York and Vermont as far south as Rutland and north to the Canadian border. The Canadian market was better, so sometimes they sold their 'rats north. His brother ate muskrat, but he never did. Their family also went fish shooting, and hunted bullfrogs with baseball bats.

He generously let us take his trapping boat temporarily. We will measure it and draw plans (like blueprints) for the boat.

- Renee