Bird Traps

I’ve been researching more ethnographic data for trapping techniques to get beyond the same handful we have all seen since our Scouting days; the Paiute, Figure-4, spring snares, etc.  While not looking at all I came across this interesting image from the archives of the Smithsonian from 17th century Italy.  The more I research, the more I learn that trapping, in the old days, was a passive-active activity, not just set the trap and go away.  Leaving the animal for any significant time allows the prey to escape or be taken by other, craftier, predators.

Text authored by Giovanni Pietro Olina, , about 1622; and illustrated by Antonio Tempesta, 1555-1630 and Francesco Villamena, ca. 1566-1624.

This trap is a great example of the active-passive nature of hunting and trapping.  The hunter, disguised as a cow is slowing pressing the flock into a tubular net, guided by the short fences on either side.

There are more tried and true ideas where this came from so hopefully I’ll be able to tease them out of the available archives and share a few more as I find them.