All our snares are 1/8" with sure locks. We can live with a fox or coyote refusal but a wolverine needs the strongest snare you can build on a land set. I've stopped used the self supported 9 wire snare's after losing 2 wolves in 1 season.

Hmmm, I like having all that wire. Cut my cable to the size I want on the loop and then go with the pigtailed #11 wire, and then can reuse the wire over and over. I just wrap the wire around a small coffee can and it makes a perfect loop and then just close the snare and wrap around the circled wire. Keeps everything nice and neat. Our snare areas change every year, so there is no leaving support wires out in the field. Just unroll, tie off wire, pull loop open for set, and go.

-TJ

tj have you given no wire a try? ;0) That is all I used for years. Till I tried them. Just curious.

TJ don't be so militant on the #9 wire! Jim Masek put on a wolf school here and never even brought up the subject of a plain old cable snare with a support wire. Must be a Up North Thing.
My Son who's in GILA on Xmas break hanging snares with me!

This thread really has my interest, because I just bought a bunch of supplies to build snares. I have been making some since last year starting with Rabbit and coyote stuff in 3/64ths and 1/16 1x19. The tear drop loop of 7x7 is something I don't care for and am surprised to hear several of you using it. It is very fast but takes such a big loop to cover the trail. Are you guys somehow loading 7x7 to get a rounder loop or just raise top of snare height to accomadate tear drop loop. I really like the pig tail swivel set up, I am going make a bunch of 3/32 1x19 wolf snares with Thompson locks. I don't care for re-rolling the #9 either. The one thing with the all cable is sometimes the twist of the cable is turned once attached to anchor and they don seem to want to hang straight like with the pigtail. When I attended a wolf school a couple years ago with Mark Schlenker (spelling?) he used the #9 pigtail swivel set-up and he seemed a really good source to me. Waterrat was there entanglement available near the two losses, I wouldn't want that experience is why I ask. Just looking for all the info avaialable before making this batch up. I read alot of the older posts related which is why I opted for the thompson locks. I also ordered a dozen of the thompson cable pieces, they don't sell bulk cable. I believe Schlenker told us the thompson cable is 7x19 and really preferred it but it is hard to find in bulk. Any other info you guys will share will be absorbed prior to starting production on these. FT do you notice the twist lay I am talking about? do you attach like shown above? TJ #11 for wolves or just the smaller stuff I can't imagine using less than #9 for wolves. I love pictures like the attach above it leaves no doubt about what someone is telling you. The one wolf I have caught last week was with 1/8" 60" 1x19 loop with #9 wire tied off without a pigtail swivel a couple strands broken as he was snared through the mouth but looks to have expired pretty quickly. The 1/8" looks big to me and harder to cover. I have snared coyotes on the 1/16" and it works great with the pigtail. I have snared two wolverine, one in 5/64ths nearly chewed through in severalplaces and one in 3/32nd with little damage to the snare although heavily twisted. I know this is a long post just trying to gather more info and learn from others experience rather than the way I usually do which is the hard way.

what is the purpose of the long snares is it to get the animal away from the catch site or does it help with tangling i see 90% of the snares in the snare shop catalog are 4-8ft long and i thought i would make a bigger mess of the site by having to walk 4-8ft over to an anchor point then back to the set spot putting on a support wire and opening the loop vs. walking up to the side of the set spot wrapping the #9 around a tree and opening the loop up. and as far as the micro locks i havent seen to much tangling in the fur all mine seem to cinch down nice and tight around the neck and while we are talking about locks what is the preferred lock i have been using the micro lock but am leaning towards the cam lock with teeth because it is suppose to be very fast and non-slipping but i want my snares to stay reliable in all conditions and moving parts don't always do that.

I started that way and HATED it. To much time cutting support wires to get things set. Much better for me to get that all done in the shed in the off season. We find spots off the trail where critters are jumping off and stop and snare them up and go.

-TJ

watterrat and trapperbob, I use #9 for wolf and wolverine snares only. #11 for everything else. #9 is just a bit harder to deal with when putting things away or making them. Used to try and double up the #14 wire for smaller snares and it just won't support a snare. #11 works great and I can even go a long way with it if I have to to get a snare connected to a solid anchor tree.

Many of my spots for smaller critters are old beaver dams and such that have trees and grass growing up out of them. I can walk along the dam, and set the snare from the side and never come up along the trail or show that I have been there.

-TJ

I am surprised to see no one mentioning kill springs. I have had pretty good luck with them especially in areas with little entanglement. Just run a long extension cable and solid anchor. When they hit the end of the cable its good night.

scotty144; The purpose of a long snare is for the following reasons as well as entanglement:

1) To allow for tying high which helps to place the snare up high on the throat and the lock on the back of neck, or close to it. When stretched out the long snare tied high will be at basically a 45 degree angle thus helping to get the snare high on the throat.

2) The extra length also provides a little extra room for a good lunge to compress the kill spring, which should be used on any coyote or wolf snare IMO.

What my buddy Pete says about coyotes and wolves. They have 3 speeds in one 2 seconds or less, fast, faster, and lightning speed. With a long snare they get a chance to reach that lightning speed and thus close the lock tighter on that initial go.

I was under the impression that a wolves will stop pulling once they feel it tightening around there neck? Correct me if I'm wrong please, that's just what I thought

ok thanks tomcat and ron that makes sense to me so you just anchor them high and leave some slack in it hang your support and hang your loop so what size cable would you guys recomend the biggest thing i have been catching is yote in 1x19 1/16 sould this continue to work good and will 14ga. wire hold them up good with a whammy and a cam lock.

Some trappers use 1X19 1/16 cable with good success but I prefer the 5/64 1X19 cable for the extra strenght and chew resistance. I find the 14ga support wire a little whimpy for holding the 5/64 cable snare in postion thus I use 11ga. But, I find 14ga ok for 1/16 cable which I use for lynx snares.

Cart

Name SKU Price Quantity / Update Subtotal
1000'

1X19 5/64" () C1X19564 - 1000 $59.00 $59.00
5/64 & 3/32 - Per 100

Cam Locks with teeth () SL003-100. $39.00 $39.00
Standard-Per 100

Steel Cable Ends () SPSTE-100 $4.00 $8.00
Compact Cable Cutter
CCC $20.00 $20.00
Subtotal: $126.00

Total: $126.00
can you guys think of anything else i will need

No swivels? You don't NEED them but they don't hurt anything and are a great anchor point.

I agree with TJ. I found that alot of times I was using alot of tie wire and spending to much time messing around cutting wire, and losing my cutters in the snow, and playing with the dang snare to get it to sit right. Now I just walk up tie off, open the loop, adjust and walk away. All my wire is cut the same length so I know what trees I can hang off of and which ones I can't.
As for disturbing the site, I can count the number of times I caught a K9 off of the same tree on one hand during a season. And when it has happened it was months apart, and after a fresh snow it really doesn't matter. I just go a little futher up the trail and hang another one.
For cable, if it's set updirectly to the pigtail, I've never had a chew out, they can't get to the cable. Regular length cables I have had plenty. I like 1/16 cable, 7x7 or 1/19, it's all I use, except for wolves.
As for the locs, I love the micro for fox, but I'm batting 50/50 with them when it comes to yotes. They fur up. Cam locs on the other hand is a differnt story.
This all just my opinion, there is no right or wrong way, and you'll figure out what works best for you and your terrain.

I'll just throw this out there for anyone that's trying some of these things for the first time like myself. I literally just walked in from making ten wire/cable setups. Why not a dozen? Because I destroyed two in the process.

I was interested in trying out the #9 wire pig tail setups described in the manual and various threads as I felt I too was spending way too much time hanging straight cable and messing with small wire guy lines. Green guys like myself may learn from my mistakes and maybe some of the experienced guys can point out mistakes in my conclusions.

I ordered up a dozen 3xx Thompson snares with tree locks. The first thing I discovered I felt they were a little too long to connect right to the ferrule in addition you have the tree lock to contend with. So I snipped those babies once I determined how much I would need for a decent loop. I was cutting about 17 inches off of the 72 inchers. This left me with approximately a 16/17 inch loop and a couple for the pigtail connection. It didn't seem to make sense to order something that I would have to destroy right off the bat. Next time I'll custom order or just make my own.

Next mistake-I slid a small washer on the cable and then a ferrule. I was thinking that the washer would be nice to pull against the pigtail as I figured this was kind of a built in swivel. Now I'm not sure. I wrapped the first wire on and found that the washer just interfered with the lay of the cable against the wire causing an odd twist to the snare...plus it looked like a five year old did it. So I had to peel the wire off, snip the cable and re ferrule.

Then I remembered I wanted to try loading. I set down the first snare and started on the second just in case things went bad. They did. Someone posted that you get a feel for it. This is definitely true, it just took me a snare. I went a little hard out of the gate and through the process of trying to "unload" destroyed the snare. Learned a lot at the cost of one snare. The next 8 or 9 went well-perfect loops decent speed. Then I got a little too experimental and destroyed another one...ten snares with 8 feet or so of wire. May be excessive, not sure yet. Better to have too much I guess.

Then I have to thank TJ. Although I couldn't find a coffee can in the shop there was a propane tank sitting there and the handle worked perfect for wrapping the wire into nice tight loops. I washed them off in Coleman fuel and that's where I am now.

I will have to say that the first few took an amazing long time and the last few were going pretty quick. There was one point where I was just going to toss the whole works and side with the anti wire guys, but now I'm going to give them a try.

I was able to set up two snares with a four wheeler and a vise as anchor points in less than three minutes. I then herded the dog through the shop and they worked perfect. He hates trapping season.

i agree with you hft on the pigtail ready to go snares i relly liked them this year the long snares never made sense to me until today it still seems like they are more work to set up it looks like i am going to have to do some testing this year i havent had any problems with the yotes in the 1/16 but i have had some broken strands and i dont want an animal to get away with a necklace i think i will get a few smaller spools of cable in different sizes and see what style snare works best for me i have never used the long snares and before i got the northern beaver/fox snare i used thompson snare and i would spin 3 strands of 14 together and wrap them around the snare to do the same thing as the pigtail.

I use pigtails and #11 on all my snares for smaller critters, works great, fast in the field, and that is what I like. End of hte year is kind of a pain, but what I do is take a coffee can with me when I am pulling snares and that gets them pretty close to perfect again, except for the few bends at the end from where you tied it off.

On the wolf snares, I have to recommend getting the thompson snares from wilson jr. Spek talked about them on the forum earlier this season, after making some wolf snares on my own, i called Dean and ordered some up, it is the only way I will go in the future. Just SO easy.