KUGLUKTUK
John Kapakatoak knows a thing or two about trapping.

Kugluktuk elder John Kapakatoak, 71, sits among his annual harvest of fox furs. - photo courtesy of John Franklin Kaodloak

"I started off by walking, when I was a little boy about nine or ten years old," the 71-year-old Kugluktuk man said.

He hasn't walked the lines since he was a boy, moving to dog sled in the 60s and later to a snowmobile.

Kapakatoak said he would trap on the weekends while employed as a truck driver for the hamlet. Now retired, he has turned back to his first love - trapping.

He hits up his trap line mid fall and closes it again in January or February.

"I've got to do other things," he said.

Following this year's hunt the savvy trapper's family captured photos of the elder with his harvest of over 130 foxes and a handful of Kalviks to post on social media.

"I work for my family, I hunt for my family," he told Nunavut News North when we reached out to see what the story was on all the foxes.

Kapakatoak said he will stay out on a trapping trip for 15 to 17 days at a time before returning home for a resupply.

On a really good year he'll trap as many as 200 foxes, though in recent years his harvest has been as low as 60. "That's a poor year, that's a bad year. No foxes that year."

He had no complaints about his latest harvest.

"It was pretty good, not as good as last year, but I was still kept pretty busy in the camp skinning and drying and slicing the fat off and cleaning them to take to the conservation officer," he said.

With help from the hamlet conservation officer the prepared furs are sent to Ontario. One pelt might sell for anywhere between $35 and $100, though a price between the two is common.

Kapakatoak said he traps for an income, but also to keep occupied.

"I keep busy trapping, I skin my furs the same day I catch the fur, that's how I do my work," he said.

"I like to be busy."

'I work slow but I get things done'

And busy he is, getting as little as three hours sleep when trapping is at its peak.

"I take it easy. I make breakfast and supper. I work slow but I get things done. "I like it, I enjoy everything I do."

Since Kapakatoak goes on these trips by himself he brings a satellite phone and a bush radio to keep in touch with his family.

"Nowadays communication is very easy, but a long time ago there was nothing."

He has been working to pass on his knowledge of the hunting style to his older grandchildren - he has 15 - and other youth in the community.

When Kapakatoak is not trapping he uses his on the land skills as a guide for sport hunters - a practice he said is totally different than hunting on his own or with family.

He also hunts caribou, grizzly and seal.

"I hunt caribou for myself and for my family for country food, that's what we live on mostly, country food -- fish and caribou."

In the 80's he would hunt seal the way he does foxes.

"When I used to hunt seal for an income for my family my record was 64 seal in one day. That was in '82 or '83," said Kapakatoak.

"He's all knowledge," said that elder's son-in-law John Franklin Kaodloak, who noted that his father-in-law's skills are a rarity these days.

"He knows all the trails and how to trap and hunt. He knows the land."

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