Chapter 261 - 117: Live Capture Cage for Catching Sheep (Part 2)
Now that he had a vine weaving guide, he felt very confident about net weaving or knot tying.
As for fencing to trap sheep, that would require a lot of time to enclose a one-way fence on the mountains and to herd the sheep into it. Chen Zhou didn't think he had the skill to do that by himself, not even with Lai Fu's help.
...
Returning to the cave to prepare the trap tools, he conveniently brought along the female goat, while the male goat, seemingly worried about his wife, followed from a distance.
Walking up front, Chen Zhou occasionally turned back to look at the male goat, thinking that once home he must tie up both of these fellows.
Below the platform was a large field of crops, unable to withstand these two guys' devastation; not to mention the open space on the other side of the hill where many Autumn White Almonds were planted. If they got bitten by the goats, it would surely cause him deep distress.
...
The weather was favorable, allowing a smooth return to the cave without any rain.
The sky even revealed a rare sight of stars and moonlight, and the wind had ceased, making the island more tranquil than ever before.
Having tied up the female goat, he also caught the male goat and tied it at the forest's edge, away from the fields.
With the oil lamp lit, Chen Zhou prepared his goat-trapping equipment.
His initial plan was to first set up a few simple snare traps, then spend time constructing a live capture cage, placing coarse salt inside to lure the goats into the cage.
There was plenty of wood at home available for making the live capture cage.
Most of it was leftover substandard planks from floor laying, just needing some treatment with a handsaw before use.
However, Chen Zhou didn't want to waste precious nails and hoped to replace them by reinforcing with knots.
Although he possessed a sufficiently detailed vine weaving manual, he hadn't yet read through and practiced it step by step, thus he would need to learn and use knots on the spot for crafting the live capture cage, requiring more time.
...
According to Chen Zhou's understanding of the goat herd.
Before nightfall, those cunning beasts would leave the platform and head to the other side of the mountain, returning only at sunrise.
Night was the perfect time to set traps.
Studying fervently by lamplight with the mentality "sharpening the knife before battle is better than not", Chen Zhou quickly learned several simple knot techniques, and upon practice, he was quite satisfied with the results, proving more effective than the slip knots he commonly used.
Feeling that he had firmly memorized the knot techniques, Chen Zhou picked up his backpack, carrying coarse salt for luring wild goats, while also packing some leftover hazelnut shells and pine nut shells—
These nutrient-dense nuts were highly favored by goats, especially roasted pine nuts, which emitted a scent of pine oil even from the remaining shells, possibly more alluring to goats than the salt grains.
In fact, if corn kernels were available, trapping goats would be much easier.
Based on Chen Zhou's understanding of goats, corn kernels were exceptionally attractive to them.
Goats ate corn kernels indiscriminately, and he had often heard villagers talk about goats overeating corn kernels until they died, proving corn kernels to be tremendously effective in luring goats.
Unfortunately, there was no corn on the island, otherwise, besides using them as goat bait, roasting corn, steaming corn, or using it as fish bait would also be excellent.
Stuffed a few large bundles of hemp rope and cut canvas strips into the hiking bag, tucked the hand axe at his waist, carried the prepared planks, and lifted the oil lamp with the other hand.
Calling Lai Fu along, Chen Zhou set off directly.
...
The reason for not making the live capture cage inside the cave and bringing it to the trapping spot was that Chen Zhou felt it was "taking off pants to fart—quite unnecessary."
The constructed live capture cage was large and cumbersome, barely able to carry two at most, seriously affecting the pace, so it was better to carry the raw materials instead.
At the same time, Chen Zhou also brought the hand axe, allowing him to gather local materials by chopping and trimming branches and sticks if needed once at the site.
...
Traveling through the night, by the time the moon was high, Chen Zhou had arrived at the spot where the goat herd had previously rested.
The ground was littered with goat droppings, faintly emitting the gamey smell of goats.
Putting down the planks, during the process of searching over the mountainside for places to set snares and arrange live capture cages, in the light of the oil lamp, Chen Zhou spotted much undried dung.
Most were pellet-shaped, indicating the animals were in good health.
Some that were not well-formed suggested digestive issues or a diet of grass with high water content, causing slight diarrhea.
Among the many dark-brown dung piles, some conspicuous bright yellow droppings stood out, which were from suckling lambs.
This type of droppings occurred only when the milk from the mother goats was overly concentrated and high in nutrition.
...
By analyzing the distribution range of lamb droppings, one could roughly understand the exact whereabouts of the mother goats.
Chen Zhou used stones to mark several suitable positions on the ground, returned to the planks, carrying the oil lamp to illuminate the surroundings, discreetly calculating how many live capture cages he could make with these materials.
He had brought a total of nine planks on this trip, and according to his previous estimation, they were barely enough to make two frames for the live capture cages.
As for the walls surrounding the frames, additional thick wooden sticks would need to be chopped to supplement.
Recalculating and sketching the rough outline of the live capture cage and the required plank lengths in his mind, Chen Zhou dared not delay and immediately pulled out his hand axe to get started.
Without employing modern spring mechanisms, the structure of a primitive live capture cage wasn't complex, primarily using a pull-line trigger mechanism.
Any animal that entered the cage just needed to pull the fine string connected to the bait food to make the door close.
For Chen Zhou, this trigger mechanism was the simplest, most practical, and the only type of live capture cage he could build.