How well do mink, marten and ermine respond to tainted bait? Tainted fish head, tainted bird. I'm thinking the guys in Southeast will have some good insight. Thanks.

I don't like tainted fish. I pretty much start with fresh bait of all types, and add as the season goes. Our conditions pretty much assure a taint eventually, and I do change out fish heads before they spoil.
That said, by seasons end, some wolverine cubbies are pretty rank.

Marten don't seem to mind tainted bait. However, I don't like using it as I don't like the smell getting all over everything, and I don't see a need for it. Same reason I don't like skunky marten lure.
I have hard enough time getting mink to go for any type of bait; I surely wouldn't intentionally use tainted bait for mink.

Marten and ermine respond the same, in my experience, to fresh or tainted baits. The mink seem to respond better to fresh, especially with fish.
I am not a fan of super loud smelling lure or bait either.

I used tainted bait for years. Either subsistence caught salmon, salmon eggs and some years beaver. All for marten. My thinking was tainted put out a stronger, farther reaching smell. Also used seal oil for a few years for it's strong, long lasting smell. Seal oil was kind of my "lure".
Caught lots of marten and sometimes mink.
mt

I catch my beaver the first week of October, chunk them out, wire them and put them in a 5 gallon bucket in a outside shed till the season opens. I think beaver tainted or not is over all the best bait. I save all my salmon heads and freeze them, pretty good fresh for mink, tried all salmon heads one year for marten and didn't do to hot. The best tainted bait for mink I have found is rotting down any ocean fish, that stuff lasts smell wise a looong time! I have used duck carcasses fresh they work for everything, not so much tainted.

Fresh bait for mink, marten and weasel although marten will respond better to the tainted than the others'

I prefer to use fairly fresh bait for the mustelids,and cat,and tainted for canines.

Thanks you guys, you're echoing pretty much exactly my experiences. Typically bait stayed frozen all season although there were years with big shrew problems. Now with less cold season openers the tainted bait thing becomes an issue after a week or two. Big job to rebait very many sets plus it cuts into the catch.

Oh...... at first I thought this was another thread about Congressman Adam Schiff......!

Pete

Yeah Schiff doesn't pass the sniff test either!

For bobcat trapping, does is matter if the beaver or muskrat is frozen?

They will come to a frozen beaver and maybe try finches on it but their jaws are not as strong as canine. Best results for me is a thawed beaver. Not saying they won't come or try to eat it. Just speaking from what I have seen.

How do you keep it thawed, strike2x?

Thaw it good and then cover it like the cats do. My temperatures are not normally cold enough to freeze it solid before they eat it all. If it is cold I will salt it. Sounds crazy but works. I go back to my bait sites every day and put the beaver back in the cubby, more of a bait pen and cover good again. I will take a picture of my cubby tomorrow and post it. It probably isn't what most picture when they think cubby.

Interesting. You have colder weather than I do. I'll watch for the picture.

A thawed completely beaver with daytime temps in mid 30s and 20s at night. Which is actually a little cold for normal year a beaver will stay plyable for 3 or 4 days. By then it will be mostly gone and I put a new in on the 5th or 6th day. All I am doing is keeping it interested another 10 days or so. Then I can set trap. I didn't get out to the set sight today, had to head to in-laws.for our Thanksgiving dinner and my wife and her mother go black Friday shopping. And they think trapping is crazy.....

My season starts 12/26 and goes for 5 weeks. I need it to last 4+ weeks if necessary, not 4 days, so I may quarter some beaver & use salt, and/or get out & trap some more beaver or muskrats. If you get 1, post a picture

This is my walk through cubby. It is big enough I could crawl through it. Before I get all the flack about how long it takes to build, how cats don't visit them and all I will say. This is the same cubby I used last 2 years and got my cat from. I can only get one so I don't care if it gets destroyed, I have a year to rebuild it. As far as cats not visiting or commitment to them I will say again, same cubby I got my cat last 2 years and I have a nice male coming around regular and eating the bait I leave. I do catch cats in coyote sets, in fact more this year than last but I like playing with the cubby and watching my cat for a while before I set it. I will set a trap at each entrance. Last year I had an opossum in one and my cat in the other.

Looks good, to me. I would add an attractor in front of the entrances. A bird wing or cd on thin fishing line, perhaps?