Others may think that Echigo is a region completely covered in heavy snow, but actually that is not the case. As I mentioned earlier, the northern area has calmer weather. The snow tends to be deep in the southeast counties of Uonuma, Kubiki, and Koshi, or Kariha and Mishima. Kanbara is a large county where there isn’t a lot of snow, but places in the southeast, like Ouha and Takayama, have heavy snowfall.
Cattle are not used during the heavy snows, because while we have special tools and footwear to help people work in the snow, we have nothing of the sort for the cattle to use. If you make the cattle work in the snow, they will sink before you know it. So one of the hardships of people in Snow Country is the fact that you cannot use cattle to help with all that work- it's all done by people. For half the year, from October to the beginning of April, all you can do with the cattle is feed them.
Now, as I said before, most animals migrate to warmer areas when winter comes. However, some animals are not able to escape the cold in time, and these animals become hunting game. There are a few varieties-- there is the wild boar, but it's quite ferocious, so it's especially difficult and dangerous to hunt them in the deep snow. On the other hand, deer and antelope are weaker and easier prey. Deer are relatively slow in the snow, and like to stay at the edge of mountains rather than venturing too deeply.
The truly skilled mountain hunters can find the whereabouts of the animals by looking at the footprints in the snow. They can tell when the animal passed and how long ago. If you can track footprints, you will definitely find a deer. I asked the people in Futai, a village further north from Mikuni Toge, about deer hunting. When the villagers hunt deer, they wear equipment that helps them maneuver through the deep snow. They ready their hatchets and enter the mountain with matchlock guns, handguns, or sticks. The deer will try to run away when it spots a human, but there is no need to run. Your footsteps are muffled as you go through the rice fields, and once you catch up to the deer, it's over. Some people might even grab the animals by the horns and throw them down, then stab it with a sword. This is a common scene in the Snow Country.