Answer:
The nation that established colonies in Canada consisting of small group of traders who focused on the trading of fish and fur was France.
Step-by-step explanation:
The first attempt to colonize Canada failed in 1541. Newfoundland was annexed to the British Empire by Sir Humphrey Gilbert in 1583. The first permanent French colony was Acadia, current Nova Scotia, founded in 1604 by Samuel de Champlain, followed in 1608 by the Colony of Quebec. In 1627 Cardinal Richelieu founded a stock company: the Company of the Hundred Associates to be the nucleus of French civilization in the New World. In 1628, Sir William Alexander established a Scottish colony in present-day Nova Scotia. The French founded new settlements in Trois-Rivieres in 1634 and Montreal in 1642. In 1663, under the reign of Louis XIV, the colony of New France came under the direct authority of the king, and the fur trade in New France was granted as a monopoly to the West India Company. In 1670 the Hudson's Bay Company was founded to allow the British Empire to exploit the region but its bases fell before a French expedition in 1686. The conflicts between both countries led to an open war in 1754 in the Ohio Valley which was peaked in 1756 with the Seven Years' War.