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Minks

I think mink are the most fearless animals on the island. Like the fox, deer, and raccoon, they often get into your domain, even under the house, but when confronted they seldom seem to run, and sometimes walk right up to you. Since they are small, quiet animals, low to the ground, with expressionless faces, they engage your curiosity rather than raise fears. But your curiosity will not be easily requited.

Mink are credited with eating just about any fish or flesh, including chickens in a coop. While waiting for the school bus one morning, my wife and son once saw a mink carry a muskrat corpse into one of our woodpiles. More on mink and muskrats later. I've only once seen a mink with something in its mouth

I was out looking for otters. At first I thought I saw a small otter standing on the ice, but I soon noticed that the animal was much smaller than an otter, and displayed much less nervous energy. Then the mink ran with the fish all the way back to its den in the beaver dam.

A month earlier, November 1999 to be exact, I saw this mink hopping all around the beaver dam, which also served some beavers as a lodge. When beavers prepare for the winter, they sink sticks in the water in front of their lodge that they can eat later when the pond freezes over.

This propensity for mink to pose doesn't require the relative quiet of a beaver pond. I saw the mink below from my boat on the rocks at the old quarry on Picton Island in the St. Lawrence River.

Mink can be mistaken for the larger fisher. It too has a bushy tail, somewhat pug face, small ears, and low slung body. A major difference is that fisher are shy of being out in the open. Although I got a good video of one once: