His cat lures were really great.

my dad [WAYNE DERRICK{G MAN}] MAKES BATE[LURE]. i know how hard it is to make bate that works. some work in summer some will work winter, and some wont work at all. the thing is that indaviduals put alot of time and effort into them. like dad he has been making a living with his bate for alot of years. when big companies buy a formula then mass produce it.with no knowledge of how it[the bate]works best. thay are after your money. not saying that some of the bate dont work most of thjese are old NELSON formulas.

Walkingstick2 - As I was checking my line I was thinking about this same thing today. In the past I have known guys who have taken up canine trapping and started taking numbers of fox right off the bat. This was years ago but they could catch them fox using sloppy habits, set construction, not pay any attention to scent, using the same techniques and sets I was using, same lures, etc. Even way back then I started to think that the foxes just don't smell him or maybe he has some type of smell that don't scare them. I dunno - but I thing there may be some validity to this theory.

Mark

sorry to burst to your bubble mr. dobbins but the post was not intended to market the private makers bait LOL... on a serious note i pm'd both the gentleman and asked if i could use their names associated with their bates as a comparison for the commercial bait/lure i also have been using. but hey, IMO if they get some business out of it good for them.

i really appreciate everyones posts and the reasoning that went along with their train of thoughts, there was some really good stuff. i found it very informative and saw alot more different variables about trapping that i never really thought about. heck the more i think about it.... it varies from property to property that i trap..

thanks

No bubbles were injured here. It looked like what I said. That's all.

It certainly has been a good commercial

No offense to anyone but word of mouth probably started a lot of bussiness's with a good product....also competition should make everyone work harder to keep their product at the top...it is good. If some trapper like huntinglonewolf is doing very well trapping using his own lure r bait then sooner or later the guys who want to copy this success will be wanting some....we still operate that way and always did. So yes it was a good commercial...on the flip side I have seen Marty openly share his altered Nelson recipe and tell how he made his bait on open forums. Doesn't seem to me like a guy hiding secret recipes.....Mac~

That is correct. I have posted it several times trying to help people out with making it. I have made it the last 3 years and for me I know it works great.

I been around a little while myself and tried probably more commercial lures and baits than most people, as well as made many different lures.

Variables occur for many reasons. Like mentioned, some ingredient maker happens to change something. Perhaps a year or more of age on the same lure mix, and on and on.

Results can change with different individuals for different reasons as well. Most have already been mentioned right down to the confidence factor.

However, bouncing around the nation and trapping in many different areas, I have slowly been convincing myself that the type of vegetation in different areas has more to do with lure effectiveness than the usual thoughts of heat, humidity, soil texture, or abuse of odors by other trappers in the general area. Like all trappers, this theory came to me slowly, and I will quickly admit that it is only a theory, or personal thought with only some personal experience to justify the idea.

Interesting posts. Walter Arnold, a name probably not recognized by most young trappers today, wrote just about the same thing that Paul Dobbins explained. For some unknown reason, different formulas work differently for different folks. And that can be found in some of his writing that was composed before most posting on this thread were born. LOL

One interesting peace of information concerning lures and lure making was handed to me by James Lucero. In a brief note attached to one of his brochures, he explained that he thought many lure makers got carried away with lures that have a large number of ingredients, instead of just compounding a solid lure. Just something I thought I would share.

God Bless and take care

Mac

For those that say location is all that is important, they have never did any real experiments with lures or trapped enough numbers to make an accurate comparison. It is really difficult to pin point catch ratio percentages unless one has trapped hundreds of animal per season. Then they can easily see a numbers increase or decrease of say 30% one way or another depending upon what lure formulas they are using. Sure, location is essential as the #1 prerequisite or one will catch nothing but the difference in lure formulations is probably the #2 most important factor at least in trapping canines and cats. I have thouroughly tested at least 40 formulas over the years, many of them provided to me by some of North America's most productive trappers. I have tested lures that sounded good at face value knowledge about lure ingredients that produced nearly zero activity at sets to some that caused intense activity. Sometimes the only difference was one ingredient or the amount of that ingredient in the lure. An excellent ingredient would be found and tested that did great things so human nature would say that if a little is good some extra would be better. That theory does no apply to trapping lures with animals that can smell 400+ times better than we can. I have seen the doubleing of good attracting ingredients turn the results to near zero. Novice lure makers it seems are always attempting to seek or produce the world's strongest lures in the belief that they can call animal's long distance or in the belief that all set walk-bys didn't smell the milder lure. In actuality, a stronger formula may call a few extra animals in closer but it is a stand-off as milder lures generally get more intense reactions and less set avoidance. Proper location with a limited amount of milder lure applied to the set will most always come out #1 in the long run. I don't believe in skimping on lures but neither do they have to be overdone. I used to know an old-time red fox trapper from Crystal Michigan that sent me his harvest pictures every season, ranging from 80 to 120 red fox. He told me that he used ONE 1 OZ BOTTLE of Fox Super All Call per season for 50 consecutive years, no bait, no urine, only a dab the size of a bb. Personally, I would be a little hesitant and uncomfortable to skimp that far but it does prove that most of us probably use lures excessively rather than learn to hone locations, learn more about the animals we persue, pay more attention to detail and use a good lure as the final tool. When I read that some reputable lures work for one but not for others I find that hard to believe. I may be wrong but I think its simply in how thay are using and applying that particular lure, not in the trappers chemical make-up clashing with the particular lure formula.
No, this isn't a commercial, just things I have been thinking as I've read this forum for 10 years. Asa

Very Interesting reading here...All I know is In my neck of the woods here in Indiana Lenon's lures works well on Coyote, and Hawbakers works really well on fox..I've tried many others, but not enough to form an opinion yet...still playing around..

Does anyone remeber the great govt. trapper from colorado springs Richard Hanes from back in the early 70s through the 80s.

I use Dobbins, Lenons, Jameson's, Fox Hollow, and I make a few lures myself. I catch animals with all of them. I am constantly swithing up lures, and will put mine in the hole as quick as anyone else's. Making lure is alot of time and work. I have spent the same amount of time and care on lures that did not produce as I did on lures that were great producers. I play around with it because it's fun to me, and it's a good feeling catching animals on something I made. I will always buy commercial lures, but will always be dable in different lure formulas on my own also. It is definitely cheaper to buy it.

Bottomline that quote could have came out of my mouth and not been anymore true, like you read my mind.