Find a small tree with a hollow base. Smear the opening with sardines in oil. Put a trail camera about 10 ft from it to see what it attracts. If, after a few nights nothing shows up, squirt some cheap pancake syrup on top of the sardines. The fishy smell should pull skunks and possums and coon. The pancake syrup on top of it may bring in grey fox. Your trail camera should verify what’s happening.

But not all such set ups work. You need to determine if there is a game trail nearby AND make sure your spot is 5-10 ft upwind of the trail.

Baits could include sardines in oil, anchovy paste, grape/strawberry or raspberry jellies maybe with a little powdered anise mixed in, liquid smoke over cat food, BBQ sauce that contains molasses, sweet feed for horses, fishmeal, etc. all of these are grocery store items except the fishmeal and sweet feed. Those are animal feed store items. A trail camera will give you some insights on how animals react to different smells and tastes. You might be surprised at knowing many baits and oils used to draw by odor won’t be eaten by the target animal. They may pick it up but after a taste or two, they’ll drop it and not show interest in the future. The trail cams will tell you this.

Get some farm raised rabbits and practice case skinning. Watch YouTube videos on skinning as well. Go to surrounding state trapping conventions if the California Association doesn’t have one and talk to people who’ve been there and done that. AND find out who does nuisance animal removal near you and see if they’ll give you some insights. There’s a lot to do between now and the better fur days of fall 2019. Put your traps away and bait up using a trail camera until animals have decent enough fur to harvest.

Yea, not many left trapping for fur. When they did away with bobcat trapping the numbers plummeted. Now you can only take bobcats with a hunting license, 5 per year. When I took the trapping test there were 20 ADC guys there taking it also, I was the only one that passed it Most were on their second and third try. Then it took the state another 90 days, after taking my payment, just to get a trap number assigned so I could start putting out traps.

In this day and age of social media, I think there might be a way to bring it back if presented properly to the younger population but is truly an uphill battle. Then again I may end up being the last California fur trapper.

Your cages need staked and covering.The coon or whatever are reaching in from the sides and firing the traps.
I thought you said you took a trapping course.

This is Golden! No wonder you call yourself the Teacher. Trail cameras I have, no one here hunts so Walmart had their trail cameras on the clearance isle, I picked up 10 Wildgame Innovation cameras with SD card and batteries for $19 each a few months ago. I have 5 of them spread out in different deer zones but still have 5 in my pack, if I can remember to take the SD cards with me, lol. Going to stop by the grocery store later and start putting out some of your suggestions tomorrow. Will post up what I get on the cams.

I want to at least catch one before I put the traps away, I spent so much time and money to get to this point it's going on my garage wall no matter how mangy it looks.

Thanks, i will get them staked and covered tomorrow. I took a self study state trapping test, but it was laws and regulations about what you could NOT do, not what you can do.

If you catch a skunk you’ll surely get an education in dispatching it! Tube type cages are much more humane on the trapper than anything else. Dispatch can’t be discussed here but you can private message members on the ADC forum and they’ll walk you through it. It would be good to connect with ADC/nuisance companies in California to get insights from them. They may even give you some critters to practice on if it’s legal to do so there. Legally harvested game is transferable in most states. But read your regulations. ADC/nuisance animals may not be.

With skunks, there is the essence issue. Some collect it while others don’t. Again, it may be because of regulations. Skinning a skunk that has not had the essence removed can be like holding a lit fuse on an unstable bomb.

Roadkills have never been my idea of a good place to practice. Too many broken bones and internal carnage. Get farm raised rabbits. At least you’ll have the meat after skinning so you’ll have something to show for it after your skinning attempts.

Cages do well when you add eye appeal, just check your regs on what you can and can't use. Imitation feathers/flagging tape work very well. For bait I like to use chunky style bait that retains moisture, but there really is no need to complicate cage trapping. Simple sets produce well on the animals you are trying to trap.

Joe. Page 2?

I must have missed something. Golf Ball, you are wrong,I have helped and still help those who ask. I don't waste my time though on the same topics that have been answered repeatedly. You can only say so many times to leave all that hocus pocus in the spice cabinet but somebody always wants to screw up a perfectly good working bait by thinking they need to add something just to be different.Seems the ones offering expert advise, their products work mediocre at best. Not helping anybody? Lol ask the gentleman that I handed a quart of coyote glands or the ones I shipped bait free of charge,or the one that received my board pattern,free. Or the free traps I gave away, The list goes on.

Thanks for the explanation,TBN.

ut oh...they rattling the cage!

This, if legal, and go back and read BOCO's post again. I seriously doubt you can trap any non nuisance animals this time of year in Kaliforniastan!

I started covering the traps and staking them, well kinda. The ground is to rocky to stake so I ended up placing large rocks on top to hold them down. Hot out there today but fished to late last night to wake up early. Got me working out there.




I packed three game cameras to take with me, and remembered the SD cards this time along with the sardines in oil.



I was looking for some promising trees that would have a hole in the base and have a place for me to cam 10 feet away. Would this be considered to big of a hollow base? The other ones I found had a smaller base but no where to cam or just to much growth around it to get to the trunk.




Got the sardines smeared around the hole and poured the oil on the bark around it, see what it brings in.

That rocky ground resembles Virginia.

I can use feathers and wings out here, going to try and add sole eye appeal. There is a pigeon trap I have been wanting to order which should stock me up on some feathers and wing flags. I am thinking I may need to add a board to the bottom of the traps to keep them level. Right now I have to do a lot of clearing to level them out and give them a flat bottom.

Yea skunk, weasel, opossum, coyote, moles, jackrabbits, certain squirrels, starling, english sparrow, and domestic pigeon open all year here.

To me carrying around boards for a trap would be a lot of work, it's already a pita carrying cages for any length of distance. Unless you're trapping on rock/ledger a good ole shovel seems to do the trick. If you're doing nuisance work and trying to rig on a structure or use to protect the surface, different story. I'd invest in a shovel or even a fox shovel so you can pack it. jmo

All it takes is a hook and a worm to catch a fish, hence boxes full of tackle and lures. Same concept IMHO. Its a forum so questions get asked over and over again in different way, but next time someone asks I should be able to answer it, thats how online communities grow instead of growing stale.

I have heard of people using it but never tried, i was not sure if it would bring them because something was in its territory or drive them out because something was in its territory.

I got a fox shovel, used it a lot today, leveling and weed whacking. That shovel and fisker lopers to get my clippings for covering the traps were the stars of the day. I like that fox shovel, it folds up and attaches to my load bearing vest.