i use the cheapest table salt i can buy. i just make the set and lastly shake on some salt. i also cut in some peat moss with my dry dirt 60-40 mixture

I once used salt as an antifreeze,...that is until I finally realized just how many coyotes were avoiding my sets because of it.
Once I switched over to waxed dirt,...my catch went up dramatically. If you don't have waxed dirt then try propylene glycol and urine mixture 50/50,...kinda expensive, but it's odorless and it works great. Waxed dirt is still my favorite.
You can also use plain dry dirt and put a "barrier" of waxed paper between the frozen earth and your dry dirt to prevent freezing and thawing.
Good luck.

yotekiller, why does the salt make the yotes avoid your sets? I could see table salt making deer snaps. But I've used table salt and had good luck with it. Now I don't like to use it, but if I have too i do.

Just wondered what your opinion is.

i just layer salt with the dirt as i mix.

i dont have problems with them avoiding the set. a final heavy layer goes on top.

charles

All I use it table salt. .33 cents a box. I catch more coyotes than I want with it. It doesn't bother them at all.

Coyotes, like every other animal in North America can smell the salt.
Believe me,...you might catch 7 out of 10 using table salt,...but not incorporating it into your sets will help catch those extra coyotes that would normally refuse your salted sets.
Salt is also very hard on your traps as well.

I have never caught more coyotes than I want, although I have caught a Lot of them.

Salt has an odor. C'Miller is correct. Coyotes and other canids will avoid it. Deer will fire your traps.

One season, after I had become reasonably a proficient fox trapper, I bought some urine from a feller I didn't know well.
Between avoidance and deer fires my fox catch was down approximately 40%+.

I could not figure this out.

Later, in the spring of the year, Mr. Kermit and I, along with several others were demoing at a state TA convention. I had a chance to sit down, and talk this problem out with Mr. Kermit.
His questions and comments were insightful, showing the broad range of his experience on the subject.

Finally, Mr. Kermit asked me in I had changed any of my suppliers during the year. I told him yes, that I was demoing at another convention, and a feller with a small lure business offered me some red fox urine at an attractive price, and I bought some. Within the TA this feller had a pretty good reputation as a lure maker.

Mr. Kermit told me that, that had to be where the problem was, that he believed the urine I bought had been salted, and to throw it out, and to start anew with some quality urine from a known dealer.

Later in the day, I had the opportunity to ask the dealer if he used salt to "preserve" his urine. He replied, "Yes, doesn't everyone?".

I threw the adultrated urine out, and began the new season with new urine, from a source Mr. Kermit recommended. My problem was solved, period, 'nuff said!

I realise that we don't not have the severe cold here that some of younes have, but neither do I believe that cold plays a major part in this equation.

Do what you will, but for my part, salt has no place on my line, as an antifreeze or anything else!

Waugh!
45/70,

No, urine will freeze,...the reason I use urine is to cut the Glycol so that it is workable and not as thick in a antifreeze application.
Just use dry dirt and a waxed paper frost barrier and you will catch more coyotes than salt.
besides,...salt is for french fries.

Gosh someone needs to call one of the top longliners in the country on Coyotes old Bob Wendt, he needs to know this as he has caught thousands and thousands of coyotes and has used common table salt for anti freeze for years?????
I think you will find that the reason you are missing spooky Coyotes isnt because of salt....... you got some other things that may need "looking into". I am not disputing that they may be capable of smelling salt, but to imply that salt by itself would be a deterant at a set; is quite a stretch from where we are standing.

I agree. The only times I've had problems with salt is if the trap was not properly waxed. Salt will cause the unwaxed parts of a trap to start rusting immediately which I believe creates set aversion. Anytime I've seen where a yote has intentionally avoided my set, it seems I find rust on the trap, chain, or the stake. When using salt, I replace the trap and stake after every catch. Works for me.

lol..i got a couple sets on a 1/4 i check on the way home, the landowner was out and about looking for some birds in the snow, and just called me to tell me i had got a coyote.

i had semi moist/dru dirt (it was a badger hole, and easy pickings) that i salted the crap out of it, and it was a trap that had seen salt all season, with severla catches, and its completly rusted, and, it has about 8-10 inches of snow on it.

ill get a pic on the way home.

this isnt no freak deal either, ive salted almost every set ive put in this year, and still made a decent catch.

think what you want, but salt does not spook the coyotes.

charles

CharlesKs,
I bet you long range sniped that salty coyote of yours with your trusty 17HMR didn't ya ??

I agree with coyotekillermiller, salt usage will cause some set avoidance with a certain percentage of animals. Coyote and red fox in my region both will many times avoid stepping on it and try to dig in from the side of the set or back. Many trappers probably don't realize how many avoidance they are getting unless they trap in snow. Some of the avoidance probably has to do with the unnatural salt odor and some from the unnatural wet look when everythhing around the set is frozen. Covering the set with layers of salt and dirt and using a thin layer of dirt on top will help some with the wet appearance. I also agree that using glycerine or propylene glycol instead of salt reduces avoidances considerably. Ace

It seems to me that the propylene glycol freezes up below about 20 degrees. Peet helps, but I still get some freezing. I am beginning to think that the only sure way is waxed dirt.

I solve the freezing dirt problem by setting in snow as quick as there is about 3" to do so. Ace

The cheapest regular salt you can buy. The only way to fly, with a good heavy layer on top like CharlesKS says.

Dry Dirt + Salt=Lots of yotes and fox on the stretchers in cold weather....

Andy

CKM..lol..no silly, a .22 rimfire with cb shorts...

ill have a pic of the salt ignorer tommarow.

charles

Why do animals avoid the smell of natural salt in a trap bed but come right up to a salt block in a cattle field? They know the smell of salt and it doesn't bother them. Contaminated traps and human scent is what keeps animals away. Not the salt.

Mr Kennedy writes...
Why do animals avoid the smell of natural salt in a trap bed but come right up to a salt block in a cattle field?

I'm not sure but a certain percentage of canines in my region will avoid salted sets. Believe me, i'm know as "Mr. Clean" and I don't set contaminated traps and definitely take all reasonable precautions to keep human scent to a minimum. I'm going to guess that avoidance occurs because the odor of salt reeking at a dirthole set is completely unnatural where the livestock salt block is accepted because it is always there. None of know how long the salt block may have possibly been avoided before the resident canines accepted it as OK and without danger. As I already mentioned, a big wet spot with frozen ground all around it or snow melted off when there is snow all around the spot could appear unnatural to wary older canines that are suspicuious of most everything. Ace

asa...i mean this with all due respect..

i wish you would move to Kansas, your working way to hard...lol

charles