ice, pond lily roots, sweet corn and pumpkin, and will eat
almost all kinds of vegetables.

It will be seen that in captivity the food problem would be easily
solved. They are very fond of wild rice, and those who have ponds
suitable for muskrats and are contemplating the raising of these animals
would do well to sow them with wild rice. The rice may be obtained from
almost any of the seed houses and it will grow in six or eight feet of
water. They are also fond of pumpkins and it is a cheap and satisfactory
food.

Some of them will lay up stores of food for winter, but they do not all
do this. Where the streams are rapid they can get out to hunt for food
at almost all times, and where they are located on lakes and marshes
that freeze over in winter they can find plenty of food in the water
under the ice. This food is taken to the feed bed to be eaten.

In early spring the warmth from their bodies will sometimes thaw a hole
through the ice over the bed and the muskrat stops this hole with grass
roots, etc. The trapper is looking for just such places and it is the
bunch of grass roots on the ice that gives them away. The steel trap is
soon in place, awaiting the coming of the animal, and many of them are
trapped in this way.

The breeding habits of the muskrat are different from those of other
fur-bearing animals, as they will have three litters in a season. The
first are born in April, and there will be from six to nine young. It is
claimed that the female of the first litter will also bear young that
season and this accounts for the small rats, or kits, caught during the
fall season.

It would appear from this that the animals should increase in numbers
very rapidly, but they have many enemies other than man, and perhaps
one-half of the muskrats born in a season never reach maturity. With the
exception of man, their greatest enemies are the birds of prey, such as
owls, hawks, buzzards, etc., but chiefly the owl, as it is a nocturnal
bird and has a fine opportunity to capture the unwary. The fox
frequently makes a capture, as does also the mink and otter.

It is a deplorable fact that there is a large proportion of small
animals in the trapper's catch. These are the young muskrats, for while
they grow rapidly the first summer, it requires several years for them
to attain full size, yet they class as No. 1 the first season. The old
animals are larger and their fur is more valuable than that of the
young. For those