Because of the bounties placed on scalps, the taking of people of all ages and sexes soon became something of a business on the frontier. In some cases the colonists - or, later on, the Americans - offered bounties on Indian scalps, but the greatest trafficking in scalps came as a result of the wide range of bounties placed on them by the British. Because different age and sex scalps brought different prices, the scalps had to be marked for proper payment to be given. Such bundles of scalps ordinarily were shipped in large lots of eight to twenty bundles, comprised of eighty-eight to one hundred scalps per bundle, or no less that seven hundred scalps per shipment. Scalps taken for British bounties were ordinarily shipped in these bundles to the governor of Canada in Quebec. Each scalp was stretched on a painted willow hoop and further painted on the inside of the skin. The colors and markings were used in a wide combination so that all of the necessary information about any particular scalp could be had at a glance. The basic hoop and scalp markings denoted the following:
| Four-inch hoop painted black | Soldier |
| Four-inch hoop painted red | Man other than soldier |
| Four-inch hoop painted green | Old person |
| Four-inch hoop painted blue | Woman |
| Two-inch hoop painted green | Boy |
| Two-inch hoop painted yellow | Girl |
| Two-inch hoop painted white | Infant |
| Skin painted red | Officer |
| Skin painted brown | Farmer killed in house |
| Skin painted green | Farmer killed in field |
| Skin painted white | Infant |
| Skin painted yellow | Girl |
| Skin painted white with red tears | Small boy |
| Skin painted half white, half red | Older boy |
| Skin painted yellow with red tears | Mothers |
| Hair braided | Wives |
| Black spot in center of skin | Killed by bullet |
| Red hoe in center of skin | Farmer |
| Black ax in center of skin | Settler |
| Black tomahawk in center of skin | Killed by tomahawk |
| Black scalping knife in center of skin | Killed by knife |
| Black war club in center of skin | Beaten to death |
| Yellow flames in center of skin | Tortured to death |
| Black circle all around | Killed at night |
| White circle all around with yellow spot | Killed by day |
| Small red foot | Died fighting |
The Wilderness War by Allan W. Eckert, page 450
Little, Brown & Company, Boston, 1978