So today I caught several small weasels. We mainly have short tails around here and most are like the ones on the left side of the picture. I've never seen least weasels. My question is are these smaller weasel least weasel or adolescent short tailed?

I might be wrong but I don't think least weasels have a black tip on the tail.

Those aren't least weasels. Least have a tiny tail barely an inch long and no black tip as mentioned. (maybe a couple black hairs is all ever on the tail)

This is a least before turning white...

looks like 2 male and 4 female short tails. you need 2 different sized boards.

Fossil2 you beat me to it

Thanks for the replys everyone. Have a market for them whole so don't need to put them up.

glad you found a market like that. theyre sure a blast to catch.

So I guess that I have never caught or seen a least weasel out of all the ones I have caught. I always wondered about that.......jk

Agree with above posts-the small ones are female shorttails.

I have never caught a least weasel either. I caught one long tail once. All the rest were short tails.

I caught a weasel today also.

Two more females today. As slow as it's been around here I'm glad I'm catching something even as small as the are!

man do I ever see just a few fleas and for me that there is some Tax receipts waiting to happen @ 17$ a flea

Many times the female longtail are the same size as a male short tail. Young of the year males sometimes are the same size as female st's
now you can scratch your head.....weasel sizes vary and fleas stimulate you know what..

Love seeing the ermine. When i was a young lad, 50 or so years ago, here in ohio we used to turn over wood, tin or anything else around the barns and outbuildings and chase the little buggers around with a bb gun. Some were small mink sized. Once while setting in the grainery waiting to shoot rats, i watched a weasel climb straight up a wall to get to a birds nest up top. He made 3-4 trips with a baby bird each time.
I've always been fascinated by them. I've never seen a white one here though, and haven't seen any in 20-30 yrs now. If we had ermine here, i'd go full on trapping them.

there are some. dont really have much in the way of short tails. north part of the state they turn white.

I’ve tried to catch them before but only got field mice. Made me wonder if we really have them around here??

Agree with what others said. When you really think about mink, the size differences in males/females/etc is very similar in ratio but not quite as alarming to the eye and we’re not having to think whether any super small ones are “least mink”. Good job! Happy trapping! ScottW