As regards locomotion, Soper (1919:46), in reference to _Mustela cicognanii_, presumably in Ontario, Canada, writes that in the bounding gait the hind feet register almost, if not exactly, in the front-foot impressions, with the right front and hind feet lagging slightly behind. "The distance normally is about 19 inches, representing a regular rate of travel. . . . In traversing open spaces they resort to long, graceful leaps upwards of six feet in length. . . . I measured a record . . . of 8 feet, 2 inches."
Of _M. e. arctica_, Dice (1921:22) writes that when it runs "the tail is carried off the ground usually at an angle of about 45 degrees." Seton (1929 (2):598) states that "At Carberry [Manitoba] I have often seen this energetic little creature seeking for Mice in the deep, soft snow. Its actions are much like those of an Otter pursuing salmon. Sometimes it gallops along a log, or over an icy part of the drift; then plunges out of sight in a soft place, to reappear many yards away. . . ."
Little is recorded concerning swimming but on this score Seton (1929 (2):602) does quote J. W. Curran, who in July, 1899, at Lake Couchiching, Ontario, watched an ermine pursue a chipmunk into the water and for 100 yards before giving up the chase and wheeling around and making for shore. In swimming "The Weasel, I think, showed more of his body, and seemed to exert himself more" than the chipmunk.
As to voice, Dice (1921:22), at Tanana, Alaska, heard the ermine, when excited, bark somewhat like a mink but not so loud and Seton (1929 (2):606) quotes Manley Hardy to the effect that the species has a purring note.
Sense of smell was used by an _M. e. muricus_ that Dixon (1931:72) watched as the ermine followed a three-fourths-grown pika. Concerning the ermine at Carberry, Manitoba, Seton (1929 (2):598-599) writes that "The smell of blood must be as far-reaching as it is attractive to these sanguinary little creatures. I have frequently hung new-killed Rabbits and partridges temporarily in trees, and, after an absence, in some cases of a few minutes only, have found an Ermine mauling the game, though there was no sign of such a visitor when the cache was made."
George Measham, of Winnipeg, found sign in the snow indicating that a great snowy owl had killed an ermine and T. McIlwraith shot a bald eagle at Hamilton Bay which had the bleached skull of a weasel (probably of this species) clinging to the throat (Seton, 1929 (2):603).