Day 62, Season Spring, 505 AV
So apparently shooting at rabbits didn't work. Who knew? Nate sure didn't as he grumbled to himself, marching through the Bronze Wood and stopping at the edge. He scanned the treeline to see if there were any signs of other hunters nearby, but he didn't see any, and honestly he wasn't sure he wanted to interact with another hunter at that moment. He was far more interested in seeing if he couldn't find traces of rabbits again so he could try his newest strategy.
The idea was simple enough in execution. Nate had observed the pit trap from earlier and it was as simple in construction as it was in concept. A simple pit, dug into the ground either by hand or with a tool, and covered up with a layer of delicate leaves and a cross-crossing of light branches that would snap at the application of the least amount of pressure, dropping the rabbit inside where it could not escape.
The pit trap did not need to be overly deep, and there were plenty of small leaves and branches all over the forest floor. It seemed the most important thing about the pit trap wasn't so much how to build one so much as where to place one. The obvious place would be along the rabbit runs themselves, although Nate was suspicious that maybe the rabbits would eventually learn to avoid those runs?
Nate realized he was probably giving rabbits a lot more credit than they deserved. They were rabbits, not foxes. Now foxes were clever, and Nate had never successfully bagged one. But rabbits were not nearly on the same intellectual scale as the red vulpines. They ran down the same runs because that was what was familiar to them, and probably gave them a false sense of safety. Perhaps over a long enough time they'd learn not to go down a path if Nate kept trapping the same area, but even Nate knew not to put a trap in the same spot twice.
But the first issue was finding the run, and he had done so earlier by observing where the rabbits ran to when he frightened them with an arrow. In truth, Nate realized, he didn't even truly want to hit rabbits with his bow. Even if he'd succeeded, the arrow would likely do unacceptable levels of damage to the animal's pelt, tearing through the delicate fur with the sharp point and ruining it and making the catch unusable for anything but eating. Not that he had anything against a rabbit for breakfast, but he'd much prefer to skin it and sell the feet, pelt, and ears as well, gaining both a meal and a few Mizas at the same time.
So once again Nate found himself strolling the tree-line, looking for the tell-tale signs of rabbits. He rather wished he had some of the advantages his friend Ama had. The White Wolf Kelvic had a keen nose and excellent eyesight, and she was much faster than he was despite being much larger, her wolf form built for power and speed. If he had her around he was sure he wouldn't have to do this sort of painstaking search, eyes glued to the ground looking for chewed grasses, or the small, round and brown pellets of rabbit droppings.
Finally, after almost a bell of wandering, Nate managed to come across what appeared to be a rabbit run. The grass was pushed aside and lighter, indented to the ground implying that rabbits had often used this path to get to the taller, more delicate shoots further up. He couldn't be certain this was the run, though, or perhaps just an older trail that would not result in anything. There really was only one way to tell and that was to hide and try to see if any rabbits showed up.
