How would you recommend baiting this style of float?

Tie it to the rod you use to stake it. I used the same set up, worked nicely.

Id get boxes of half rotted produce from a country store near the farms i trapped in Oregon...sometimes id stick a whole apple on there.

what wylee said about pole

Poor luck with bait here in the fall. WAY too much cattail, bulrush, grasses and corn fields to compete with here. Simulate a feed bed with the surrounding (cut up) vegetation has worked better than any brought in bait for me.

If your going to use bait use a short chunk of poplar. Wire It to the pole you use to stake the float. Then get some poplar bud oil and add a bit to the chunk. In most cases you want the bait up high so the rat has to stand to get It. That way you will get more hind foot catches and give the rat less room to move around. With the bait right on the float the rat can climb the edge and not even get close to the trap.
In most cases every one makes the float to big you want It just big enough for the trap. Don't give the rat any way around the trap.
If It were me I'd build stools instead of floats.

And yes floats and stools don't seem to work very good In the fall In WI.

http://thebeav.us/stools.htm

Really like your setup, beav.

When you put the eye-bolt in the end of the wood like that there is no strength in the wood to hold the screws especially cedar, put it in the sides so it will hold, especially if you use a green popular as bait cause you are going to have a beaver if you like it or not.

I use a cable slip noose and drop the loop over the staking device and chinch In down tight. In about 99% of the time In this part of the country i don't have a beaver problem when trapping rats.

Thanks Beav. Do you set the stool at water level or how far below. I have not had any success with floats and will be trying stools.

Well It all depends on your laws. In ND the trap had to be 2" under water In the spring but In the fall It could be out of the water.

If It were me I would have the stool just out of the water. That way you could add some mud and some green grass for eye appeal. A chunk of poplar with some poplar bud oil wiped on will work. Or you can just use the PVC I show In my pictures.

Don't go making 100s of them until you see If they work In your area.

Parsnips work the best of anything I've tried, but carrots , squash , and apples work too.

X2 thank you for sharing. That's great stuff.

plant your parsnips now so they will be big like Les's come fall time.

notice that Les has an extra cable for drowning on his traps

In Utah here. But fresh mud piles on a stool work very well. The trick is setting them in the magic depth to insure drowning.

The hook was like that when I bought 3 of these on the Trap Shed. I could probably change that pretty easy.


I hadn't thought of using popple for rats. I have poplar bud oil and access to popple.

Used veggies from the dumpsters behind supermarkets. Just pile it on.