Table of contents for February 2022 in The Trapper

One of the more painful parts of the learning curve that most of us endure when learning the art of trapping is the emotion-changing tide that finding an empty, snapped trap surrounded by prints and a worked set brings with it. With a snap of the fingers, a trapper goes from brimming with confidence that the painstakingly crafted sets will produce, to feeling like an utter failure. Grinding salt into the open wound, is when one doesn’t even have a clue what to do about it, other than remake and hope to get blindly lucky. Well, let’s change that. Here are the best methods that I’ve found for dealing with trap-wise predators, although the general principles apply to most any furbearer. SEARCHING FOR GREENER PASTURES When longlining for cash, to…

My snowshoe trail from a week prior was lightly coated in a halfinch of fresh, powdery snow. A lone set of Canada lynx tracks, about the size of a baseball, followed the depressions that my snowshoes created in the deep powder. As I approached my first set of hidden snares, my anticipation rose as the tracks never deviated from the trail. As my son and I crested the edge of the bluff heading down to a river bottom, we were greeted by the huge yellow eyes of our first Canada lynx, held securely in a snare placed in a pinch point along my snowshoe trail. The areas that I trap in Southcentral Alaska are fur-rich; my focus has primarily been on river otters, beavers and coyotes, and I have had…

The neighbor had four horses and not nearly enough sense to keep them up. We had always helped when they needed it and this morning she needed it. She had hoped for colic, but the vet pronounced it a twisted gut. Surgery was risky and very expensive. The horse needed to be put down. I had worked with a landowner in the next valley and planned on trapping on his place in another month when the furs were prime. When she asked for my help euthanizing and disposing of the horse, I knew right where I wanted to put it. A quarter-mile off the road and tucked between a set of dunes, I put the horse down in a spot where traps would work all winter. A month later, there…

For most of my adult life, I have heated our house with wood. When I was young and brave, I used to cut logs into man-handle size pieces, which were about 100 pounds back then, and transport them to the wood yard, where I would work them into stove-size splits and stack them up. The wood yard was crude but effective. Sloped stacks of wood were covered with used barn tin. Mice went way back in the wood piles and built nests with grasses and leaves. If you happened to drop a rag, they would for certain shred that up, too, and incorporate it into their nests. Mice in the house and mice in the barn were dealt with lethally, but mice in the wood piles were not a great…

Wild hog populations are exploding and so is the damage they cause. Sadly, there is no way to eliminate all of these invasive animals. All we can do now is try to minimize their presence and the destruction left behind. Without a doubt, trapping hogs is the best way to lower the population. Unlike hunting, where you might only be able to take out one or two hogs a night, trapping gives you the possibility to eliminate an entire sounder in just one night. Most landowners with major hog problems use a corral style of trap. This type of trap allows you to pre-bait it to get the hogs accustomed to entering the trap. Once the hogs are comfortable entering the trap, it can bet set. The basic design of…

The market is still slow and the upswing we have been awaiting for so long has yet to start. The Omicron variant has taken the pandemic to yet another unexpected level of complication, and sanitary measures aimed at maintaining public health make just about every normal business activity more complicated. International travel, while possible, is still impeded and flights are canceled constantly for lack of passengers — or for lack of healthy pilots and crew members. Fears of contamination keep many people homebound and away from public areas. Retailers of business clothing have seen the impact — when people work from home, they do not need to “dress up” as they would have normally in the business world. By the same token, wearing fur to keep warm or to display…

Good directions make any endeavor easier, be it traveling unfamiliar roads, starting a new project or even fur trapping. Directions, or guidance, can enable the fur target to be lined up for an effective catch. But, poorly planned suggestion is about as good as an upside-down map! TRAVEL ALTERATION Changing a furbearer’s line of direction as it approaches a set is what good guidance is all about. However, human nature being what it is, we all get a bit overeager to alter or improve a natural setting, so before you go to excavating a couple acres, look things over. When it comes to guidance — less is often way more. Utilize what’s around, maybe a large stone, terrain feature or scrub brush can offer a way to control direction with…

It’s pre-dawn as I flick on the light in the chicken coop. Rats scatter everywhere. You would think that a professional trapper could keep up with simple barn rats — but you’d be mistaken. We often marvel at the ability of wild furbearers to avoid our traps. Many times they don’t hold a candle to these domesticated vermin. There in the chicken coop is a gap between two steel barrels about 2 inches wide. The floor is covered with straw and I’m making a place to bed a No. 1 longspring snuggled up against the barrels. The rat has to go over the pan as it comes through. I keep a couple of those traps hanging in the shed. They are traps that are too weak for muskrats, but they…

ON THE TRAPLINE WITH TOM BEAUDETTE Weather patterns, lunar phases and seasonal changes all influence coyote movement and success on the trapline. I remember one time trying to persuade the U.S.D.A. gunner to get the pilot to fly a couple of ranches for me. He said, “Come on, Tom, we got a full moon and it will be a waste of time.” I just nodded and said, “Well, OK,” wondering what a full moon had to do with coyote hunting. I never pressed him for any more information, but through the years, I made some mental notes and observations of my own. It seems that statement had some credibility. Coyotes are not as active in full moon phases during the day and they either bed early or limit their daily…

I really enjoy trapping beavers, but there isn’t much beaver trapping where I live these days. I still enjoy trapping a few of them every year, although with the prices so low I have to be satisfied with a high-quality, low-price fur. The castor is really the prize with beavers, even though I rarely sell it because it is a main ingredient for some of the lures that I craft for the upcoming season. Still, I enjoy putting up some flattails every year. The bait is welcome for the spring bear hunt and the hide goes to some of the projects that I craft. First of all, spring is a relative term in the high-altitude valleys that I live near. There have been years in the past when I was…

FEB 5: U.P. Trappers Association 17th Annual Mid-Winter Trappers Workshop for Kids and Beginning Trappers. Free trapping supplies for all kids attending. Trapping demos, fur buyer, supply vendor. Hermansville, MI. Contact Mike Lewis at (906) 774-3592. FEB 9-10: Colorado Trappers & Predator Hunters Association Fur Sale. Lincoln County Fairgrounds, Hugo, CO. Contact Greg Ashmore for more details at (719) 760-0539. FEB 12: Indiana State Trappers Association Fur Sale, Miami County Fairgrounds, 1079 West 200 N. Peru, Indiana 46970. For more information call or text Byron Tiede at 219-863-3803. FEB 18-19: Montana Trappers Association Western States Fur Auction. Park County Fair Grounds, Livingston, MT. For details contact Brian Stoner at 406-581-8583. FEB 19: Pennsylvania Trappers Association District 2 Fur Sale at Burnt Ridge Bow and Gun Club, 493 Ridge Rd. Cowansville,…