Post by Scott McCray on Apr 14, 2006 20:31:06 GMT -5
Are the Basics, Really the Basics???
I am what most trappers would call a hobby trapper. I run a small line of usually three or four dozen traps at a time, and many of those were set by my sons who are 12, and 8 this season. Being dad, I simply helped by guiding them on where to set traps. If you ask my sons they would tell you that the question they heard most this season from me is “WHY are you doing it that way?” Not because they were doing anything wrong, but rather, I wanted to make sure they understood why they were placing traps in certain spots, and if they had listened to me babble to them all of the basics of trapping.
As I sit here tonight reflecting on this past season, I started thinking about what the basics of trapping really are, and are they really Basics. In other words, Basics are things that most trappers take for granted. The things you do without thinking about them as they have become second nature. But are these things “Basics” for everyone?
The basics for me are things such as location, trap placement, bedding your trap solid, and not contaminating your set. So in the following, I will delve a little deeper into each of the “Basics”.
Let’s take them one at a time. The mother of all mistakes for the new trapper is going out and laying a ton of steel in the ground without paying attention to where they make their sets. Many trappers will tell you there are really only three factors to being a good Trapper, and they would be:
1: Location
2: Location
3: Location
If you don’t set traps where animals are, you aren’t going to catch much, and you will certainly catch more “trash” animals that way. So what are good locations you ask? Well although I haven’t trapped anywhere but in New York State, I would have to say that for the most part GENERAL locations are the same for most animals. For instance, when I start looking for coon, I generally start on streams. But not just any stream if I am looking to catch both coon and mink. I like to find a stream near one of two things. I either want it near corn fields, or near some type of hardwoods that has both Oak trees, and hemlock trees. Now, I know that the Hemlock stands sound Odd, but they offer good cover, and on a nice warm day in the early winter, late fall, you will find coon sunning themselves in these trees as they offer some cover from being seen, but also offer a good place to sun themselves, and when the corn runs out, coons will spend a lot of time going after acorns as a food source.
What about fox and coyote you ask? Well that is another issue. Red Fox and Coyotes are very interesting in their habits. Just as you and I, they tend to be lazy. If they have a choice between walking down a farm road way or walking in the thick brush, they will take the farm roadway 99% of the time. Which is odd if you think about it because the Red Fox and the coyote are two of the most cautious animals I have ever come across. I generally start by looking at an aerial photo of the farm if it is available. I am looking for areas where the crops meet either each other, or a tractor road on the property. Are there any outstanding features on the property such as points or maybe a logging road you can see from the photo? I also tend to look at where I think the deer are running on a farm when I am looking for coyotes. Generally if you find the deer trails that are heavily run, you will also find your coyotes, and sometimes your red and grey fox as well. Going back to what I said about fox and coyotes being lazy. They will follow those trails as well because it is easier for them to travel than the brush is.
Okay. Now that we have found the GENERAL location of these animals, let’s look at how to narrow it down a bit. Should be easy now that we have found general locations. We have found a few tracks, and maybe some scat. Time to set traps right? WRONG. You can set those general locations and have some luck at it because you happened to hit on an exact location, or if the wind currents have been good to you, you may draw them into your sets with your bait or lure, but why take that chance? No one ever claimed that trapping was easy, it is hard work, and that work will pay off eventually. So do a bit more ground work and find exact locations. For coon I look for over hanging root systems where the coon can hide while it eats, or uses it as a toilet. Look for logs that cross the stream. Generally these logs will have scat on them, and tracks at either end. Look for sand bars in slow moving streams that stick out from the edge. Many times you will find tracks on these sand bars as well. Look for trails that come out of the corn headed for the stream. These are exact locations for coon. There are many more, but I think you get the Idea.
As I said before, fox and coyote can be another story all together. If you see tracks, you are generally on an exact location. Fox and coyote tend to be creatures of habit for the most part. But know that they will change their habits at the drop of a hat if it suits them. Once again, look for areas of easy access, and narrow it down from there. Deer trails, Paths through hedge rows, the junction of where a field meets the farmers tractor trails, or where the tractor trails meet is also more often than not and exact location.
Now on to the next factor in the “Basics”. I will combine the second two, as they are very closely related. Trap placement, and bedding your trap solid.
This is one of the most argued subjects amongst trappers. Do you really need to worry about how solid you bed your trap? Do you really need to worry about where you place your pan? In my opinion, the answer to these questions is a definite YES.
There are a number of ways to bed your traps and make them sit solid in the ground. Why is it important you ask? It is important because when an animal such as a fox and/or coyote , and even coon in some instances approach a trap, and accidentally step on a jaw that trap moves. Now I have already said that fox and coyotes are curious animals, and just like you or I, they want to know why it moved, so they will dig at it. Generally the result of this is flipped or snapped traps that are very much empty when you get there.
There are two methods that I recommend for bedding traps solid. The first is the bowl method. The bowl method is simply making a bowl shaped hole a little bigger than your trap. When you place your trap you want the jaws to be touching dirt on all sides. Sift dirt on to the trap leaving the pan showing, and pack the dirt in, sift more dirt on, and lightly uncover the pan, and pack in again and finally, sift again to cover. There should be a slight indentation over the pan to help guide the animal into that particular spot on the trap.
The other method I recommend is to dig a hold smaller than your trap, and pound the dirt down around the hole making it just as big as the trap. And then sift and pack just as in the other method described above.
Now we get into trap placement. I have had many people say that it doesn’t really matter where you place your pan. Right, Left, Close to the hole, far away from the hole. Well in my experience, I recommend for fox that you offset your pan about 2-3 inches and about 5-6 inches back from the hole. I also use this set up for coon. For coyotes however, I offset a little more, maybe an inch, so you are looking at 3-4 inches offset, and then 6-8 inches back. If you happen to be in an area where there are a lot of both fox and coyotes, I generally set about 3” offset, and 7” back give or take a half of an inch.
Do these measurements have to be exact? NO, but it is a good place to start.
Lastly, I would address contamination of a set. Again, this is an area argued by trappers to no end. I personally do not think that human scent is a problem with fox and coyotes; however, I will qualify this statement a bit more by saying that I do believe that foreign odors are a problem. By foreign odors I mean smells like Gas, Oil, Perfume, aftershave, etc. Because of these odors, I always use gloves, generally rubber, and I almost always wear rubber hip waders that I roll down when I get into my truck, and roll back up when I get out so that I don’t get the gas and Oil odors on the outside of the waders. Now with all of this being said, there are trappers who never wear a glove and catch animals, but I have to wonder how many more they would catch if they did wear gloves.
Okay, so we have our gloves on, and hip waders or a kneeling cloth, we are good to go right? Well not quite. If you have the opportunity, make a video of yourself making a set. You would be surprised at how many times you contaminate a set. Grab your trowel with your bare hands, or your sifter, or your stakes, or your hammer. And generally this happens after you have taken your gloves off to put in bait or lure, OR worse yet, you didn’t take your gloves off to bait and lure and now those smells are on your gloves that you are going to touch your trap with. Once again, fox and coyotes have very keen sense of smell, and if they smell that lure or bait on the trap, they will dig at it, giving you unwanted results.
Once again, I would like to say that these are the basics for me. Maybe you have other basics that you take for granted, but I would be willing to bet that if you try some of these you will be successful in your trapping, and what is considered successful you ask? Well…….. That’s another story.
Scott McCray
I am what most trappers would call a hobby trapper. I run a small line of usually three or four dozen traps at a time, and many of those were set by my sons who are 12, and 8 this season. Being dad, I simply helped by guiding them on where to set traps. If you ask my sons they would tell you that the question they heard most this season from me is “WHY are you doing it that way?” Not because they were doing anything wrong, but rather, I wanted to make sure they understood why they were placing traps in certain spots, and if they had listened to me babble to them all of the basics of trapping.
As I sit here tonight reflecting on this past season, I started thinking about what the basics of trapping really are, and are they really Basics. In other words, Basics are things that most trappers take for granted. The things you do without thinking about them as they have become second nature. But are these things “Basics” for everyone?
The basics for me are things such as location, trap placement, bedding your trap solid, and not contaminating your set. So in the following, I will delve a little deeper into each of the “Basics”.
Let’s take them one at a time. The mother of all mistakes for the new trapper is going out and laying a ton of steel in the ground without paying attention to where they make their sets. Many trappers will tell you there are really only three factors to being a good Trapper, and they would be:
1: Location
2: Location
3: Location
If you don’t set traps where animals are, you aren’t going to catch much, and you will certainly catch more “trash” animals that way. So what are good locations you ask? Well although I haven’t trapped anywhere but in New York State, I would have to say that for the most part GENERAL locations are the same for most animals. For instance, when I start looking for coon, I generally start on streams. But not just any stream if I am looking to catch both coon and mink. I like to find a stream near one of two things. I either want it near corn fields, or near some type of hardwoods that has both Oak trees, and hemlock trees. Now, I know that the Hemlock stands sound Odd, but they offer good cover, and on a nice warm day in the early winter, late fall, you will find coon sunning themselves in these trees as they offer some cover from being seen, but also offer a good place to sun themselves, and when the corn runs out, coons will spend a lot of time going after acorns as a food source.
What about fox and coyote you ask? Well that is another issue. Red Fox and Coyotes are very interesting in their habits. Just as you and I, they tend to be lazy. If they have a choice between walking down a farm road way or walking in the thick brush, they will take the farm roadway 99% of the time. Which is odd if you think about it because the Red Fox and the coyote are two of the most cautious animals I have ever come across. I generally start by looking at an aerial photo of the farm if it is available. I am looking for areas where the crops meet either each other, or a tractor road on the property. Are there any outstanding features on the property such as points or maybe a logging road you can see from the photo? I also tend to look at where I think the deer are running on a farm when I am looking for coyotes. Generally if you find the deer trails that are heavily run, you will also find your coyotes, and sometimes your red and grey fox as well. Going back to what I said about fox and coyotes being lazy. They will follow those trails as well because it is easier for them to travel than the brush is.
Okay. Now that we have found the GENERAL location of these animals, let’s look at how to narrow it down a bit. Should be easy now that we have found general locations. We have found a few tracks, and maybe some scat. Time to set traps right? WRONG. You can set those general locations and have some luck at it because you happened to hit on an exact location, or if the wind currents have been good to you, you may draw them into your sets with your bait or lure, but why take that chance? No one ever claimed that trapping was easy, it is hard work, and that work will pay off eventually. So do a bit more ground work and find exact locations. For coon I look for over hanging root systems where the coon can hide while it eats, or uses it as a toilet. Look for logs that cross the stream. Generally these logs will have scat on them, and tracks at either end. Look for sand bars in slow moving streams that stick out from the edge. Many times you will find tracks on these sand bars as well. Look for trails that come out of the corn headed for the stream. These are exact locations for coon. There are many more, but I think you get the Idea.
As I said before, fox and coyote can be another story all together. If you see tracks, you are generally on an exact location. Fox and coyote tend to be creatures of habit for the most part. But know that they will change their habits at the drop of a hat if it suits them. Once again, look for areas of easy access, and narrow it down from there. Deer trails, Paths through hedge rows, the junction of where a field meets the farmers tractor trails, or where the tractor trails meet is also more often than not and exact location.
Now on to the next factor in the “Basics”. I will combine the second two, as they are very closely related. Trap placement, and bedding your trap solid.
This is one of the most argued subjects amongst trappers. Do you really need to worry about how solid you bed your trap? Do you really need to worry about where you place your pan? In my opinion, the answer to these questions is a definite YES.
There are a number of ways to bed your traps and make them sit solid in the ground. Why is it important you ask? It is important because when an animal such as a fox and/or coyote , and even coon in some instances approach a trap, and accidentally step on a jaw that trap moves. Now I have already said that fox and coyotes are curious animals, and just like you or I, they want to know why it moved, so they will dig at it. Generally the result of this is flipped or snapped traps that are very much empty when you get there.
There are two methods that I recommend for bedding traps solid. The first is the bowl method. The bowl method is simply making a bowl shaped hole a little bigger than your trap. When you place your trap you want the jaws to be touching dirt on all sides. Sift dirt on to the trap leaving the pan showing, and pack the dirt in, sift more dirt on, and lightly uncover the pan, and pack in again and finally, sift again to cover. There should be a slight indentation over the pan to help guide the animal into that particular spot on the trap.
The other method I recommend is to dig a hold smaller than your trap, and pound the dirt down around the hole making it just as big as the trap. And then sift and pack just as in the other method described above.
Now we get into trap placement. I have had many people say that it doesn’t really matter where you place your pan. Right, Left, Close to the hole, far away from the hole. Well in my experience, I recommend for fox that you offset your pan about 2-3 inches and about 5-6 inches back from the hole. I also use this set up for coon. For coyotes however, I offset a little more, maybe an inch, so you are looking at 3-4 inches offset, and then 6-8 inches back. If you happen to be in an area where there are a lot of both fox and coyotes, I generally set about 3” offset, and 7” back give or take a half of an inch.
Do these measurements have to be exact? NO, but it is a good place to start.
Lastly, I would address contamination of a set. Again, this is an area argued by trappers to no end. I personally do not think that human scent is a problem with fox and coyotes; however, I will qualify this statement a bit more by saying that I do believe that foreign odors are a problem. By foreign odors I mean smells like Gas, Oil, Perfume, aftershave, etc. Because of these odors, I always use gloves, generally rubber, and I almost always wear rubber hip waders that I roll down when I get into my truck, and roll back up when I get out so that I don’t get the gas and Oil odors on the outside of the waders. Now with all of this being said, there are trappers who never wear a glove and catch animals, but I have to wonder how many more they would catch if they did wear gloves.
Okay, so we have our gloves on, and hip waders or a kneeling cloth, we are good to go right? Well not quite. If you have the opportunity, make a video of yourself making a set. You would be surprised at how many times you contaminate a set. Grab your trowel with your bare hands, or your sifter, or your stakes, or your hammer. And generally this happens after you have taken your gloves off to put in bait or lure, OR worse yet, you didn’t take your gloves off to bait and lure and now those smells are on your gloves that you are going to touch your trap with. Once again, fox and coyotes have very keen sense of smell, and if they smell that lure or bait on the trap, they will dig at it, giving you unwanted results.
Once again, I would like to say that these are the basics for me. Maybe you have other basics that you take for granted, but I would be willing to bet that if you try some of these you will be successful in your trapping, and what is considered successful you ask? Well…….. That’s another story.
Scott McCray