How many of you trappers cover their traps in heavy rains ? pros and cons of doing so ?

to many traps to cover ,I think your talking about ,something like a bucket

Mostly I drink coffee, ponder the wonders of the world, and wait for the rain to stop. The ground permeates pretty good up here.

where i live the soil is clay. so rain is no good for traps. mostly i sit in my house and throw shots of hard liquor while cussing and shaking my fist at the sky.

i'm just forgin ahead goin what rain.gonna set traps today before the rain.

Pros - you won't need to check those traps.
Cons - you won't need to check those traps.

set or not a trap has to be checked every 36 hours by law.some co's look the other way and some love the chance to get the pen out.

I dont I run Zaggers pipe dream set and on my flat set I bed the trap in the same way. His bedding system can take a take a whole bunch of rain.
J

seems like when it rains that is when I catch the most. Why do you put them out if you are going to cover them.

The hard part of lots of rain is the getting around. My country is clay gumbo, and the farmers around don't like ruts cut in their fields and pastures. Four wheelers work, but you can't carry much on them, and side X sides are just one step better! Both are ok if your snaring, but to run much of a line, you need to carry a lot of stuff! My yota is just barely big enough, but when it's like this, it even cuts ruts! I hate rain, but the critters move good in it!

The only time I ever covered them was if I had paying quail hunters or going to be gone a couple days then I just laid a 2'x2' 3/8 plywood over them. Couple times I had yotes dig in from the side.

I just got back from checking a few snares and my tire set. If It wasn't for chopped corn fields I never would have made It. Even then It was mud slinging time.
IT's going to rain all day and all night here. I don't know why I didn't knock down those sets. I don't think AAA does off road recovery LOL

Lee answered your question. It's the same for me.

I check my line with my little Ram 50. Most of my line is on tractor lanes or the edge of crop/hay fields with no lanes. I depend on firm ground to access those areas, frozen ground is the best.

When we get heavy rain and warm temps it becomes impossible for me run my line without doing serious damage to trails and fields. Rutting up tractor trails and field edges would get me kicked off most of the properties I have permission to trap on. So when I know heavy rain and warm temps are coming, I cover my traps. It's more efficient than snapping everything off and resetting.

I covered everything this morning.

Warm rainy weather might be good for coons but I'm a fox trapper. I do best during periods of cold (below freezing) dry weather.

I wouldn't be able to trap without my atv, our season started with rain on first day, and got worse as time went on

I typically deal with a lot of moisture here in CO, it freezes my line down almost every time we get rain... Got a quarter inch yesterday and I'm still up and running, luckily. Does anybody used waxed dirt? I have wanting to make some for a couple of years now and haven't gotten around to it due to my laziness and the amount of effort it takes, BUT I will not go another season without it. Looking for some insight in it though positive or negative!

What’s a tire set?

I use straight peat here in PA. Sets thaw and get wet during the day then freeze up at night. Without peat or waxed dirt most of my line would be inoperable most of the time.

Lugnut, do you bed in peat and cover with it too? I have always bedded my traps and completely covered them in dirt as well so I am having some trouble imagining how this peat works. LOL. but I need a way to combat the moisture cause I HATE having a froze down trapline

i'm playin with straw chaff in this stuff and so far so good.

Yes, I bed and cover with peat. I make my bed the same size as my Northwoods 1.75's and about 3"-4" deep then I pound two indentations in for the levers. I put my stakes (double stakes now that I catch about one yote a season LOL) in the bottom of the hole.

I throw in handful of pre-sifted peat and wiggle the trap in. The levers and jaws are supported on the edges of the bed and some part of the frame sits on the stake heads. It's hard to describe but the trap gets rock solid. There is only a thin layer of peat under the levers and between the jaws and damp ground to keep the steel from freezing fast.

I set the night-latch then throw a few more handfuls of peat over the trap, 3/4"-1" maybe. I brush it out level and make a dip right over the pan (invites them to step there when sniffing or looking down the dirt-hole).

These are red fox sets and they seem to like the eye appeal of the different colored peat, I never blend them.

I never had much trouble with wind blowing the peat off the traps. It happens occasionally and I just throw another handful on and brush it out.

The peat will take a lot of rain before it soaks it up. Even when the top gets soaked and freezes I can just flip that frozen peat-pancake off and put a little more on. Conditions have to be pretty bad before the traps start to freeze down. It happens but not often.