We get a lot of snow-rain-slush-freeze here which makes it tough to keep foothold traps operational, particularly wolf traps. It's not uncommon to leave them in the ground for many weeks or months before getting a shot at a pack when they finally come thru. Obviously making sure the trap will fire is paramount, but equally important (to me) is leaving the set as undisturbed as possible. By that I mean not mucking around with re-luring, re-bedding, or messing around with other freeze "proof" methods. I like to make my sets and leave them alone - check from a distance and re-lure sparingly. I get a lot of questions from guys wanting to know how to keep their gear from freezing or asking what to do if a pack comes thru and they miss - should they move their traps, etc. In my experience I've always said just to leave the traps alone. If you're on location and the trap is well bedded, there's no need to mess with anything. They'll be back.

Took the go-pro out yesterday to experiment with some POV footage, but it turned out too shaky to bother editing so I just grabbed a few screen shots for a pictorial on how I bed traps for the long haul.


Standard dirthole for me most of the time. Caught a nice black male out of this exact same bed 2 years ago. It's at the intersection of a couple game trails in a brushy draw along one of their core travel routes. Here I'm using a modified TS-85. First I bed the trap to where it won't move at all, then cover it with a healthy layer of dirt, pick the trap up and shake it back down into the waxed dirt base. If necessary, I'll use my knuckles to knead/push the native soil up against the waxed dirt and get the outer jaws packed in good.



Setback varies at each set due to slope, travel, approach, etc. I just put the trap where I think they're gonna step and guide them from there.


I use crumpled waxed paper because of the way it forms to the trap pan. Settling can be a big issue after lots of rain and I don't want any voids in between the jaws. Personally I've never cared for the way a screen forms around the pan - just a personal preference thing.


Cover with another healthy layer of waxed dirt and most importantly - use a stick to tap around and gently trace out the pan to get the dirt packed and settled in the jaws. This is a crucial step that I spend some time on. In my opinion, and is the most important part of getting the trap bedded for the long term. After you've got it all tamped in, the trap is fully cocooned in waxed dirt and should be able to withstand a lot of weather. That said, there does come a point when nothing will work. Here I'm trying to keep this set operational for the next 4-5 weeks of conditions like the picture, then I'll probably be totally snowed out.



Blending should be minimal and just enough to blend the color of the dirt. This is another crucial step - too much cover and it'll freeze and be like a drum. There was a pretty big contrast here between waxed dirt and the native soil, but there's enough leaf litter and other stuff to help blend. I don't use a sifter, just loosely scatter some blending over top from the site. Working in from the edges here:


Final set with some blocking. This site is pretty exposed and I expect a lot of snow-rain-freeze here for the next month or so. I baited it with half a muskrat down the hole and will check from 40 yards away without going back unless something is disturbed. There were fresh turds in several locations near here and I know they'll be back thru. Hopefully get to show the remake!

Good info.

Great thread!! Thanks and can’t wait to see a Wolf!

Thanks for the tutorial Jumper. Good info right there. Thing that gets my lines are the massive snow storms that dump 2-4 feet over night. Had one storm a couple years back the dropped 6ft over a 12 hour span. Still working on some idea and trials for those times. Jon.

I know a few excellent wolf trappers, one whose job was trapping wolves for the government at one time, who deal with that in Montana. Their solution is just bed another trap on top of the snow. According to them it’s not unusual to have 5 or six traps stacked on top of each other by the end of season.


Awesome tutorial. How do you feel about using calcium chloride? That’s what I’ve been using for a few years and I like it. I’m trapping coyote though, so I’m picking up and moving sets long before 4-5 weeks of no action. I hope we get a season on wolves here. The NDOW doesn’t recognize that they are here, but they are. The elk herd in the Jarbridge area is already suffering.

Great information, thanks for sharing.

Awesome share. Thanks for taking the time to take pictures and explain your method.
Mac

Jumper -

What you've posted above is about as good a tutorial as I've ever seen. Kudos for taking the time to make the photos and post 'em, with your step-by-step instructions. With a few modifications, I would suggest that your methods would work just as well for coyotes in freeze/thaw conditions as well. Very nicely done, sir!

Jack

Jumper, great pictures. A lot of knowledge there.

Thank you Jack! Appreciate the feedback. It's been many years since I took the class and a lot of trial and error since then. Enjoy sharing lessons-learned to help others cut down on their learning curve. I need to get back to a class and see what the state of the art/science is with your latest applied research.

Jmack - Assuming you can still access trap locations, you can use those storms to your advantage for a little while at least. Find the trees or sheltered locations (thick dog hair stands, etc) within existing travel routes that stay relatively snow free (they're out there) and set those now. Everything has trouble after those storms and those sheltered locations serve as natural lay up areas. You can even "cultivate" those spots by putting some bait there to entice the wolves to check back. Use some larger bones that ravens/coyotes can't pack off. Letting a road killed deer melt into the ground works great. Obviously, make sure you mind the bait setback rules.

Bob - it's certainly worth a shot if the conditions cooperate. I've tried snow sets a lot, unsuccessfully. Our weather fluctuates to where the trap usually melts out pretty fast or the fresh snow gets rained off during the day or freezes bulletproof over the trap at night. And leaving big post-holed bootprints in the snow seems to scare them off in my experience. Definitely part of the repertoire though. To the calcium chloride question - only tried it once and never again. It works great at first then loses it's effectiveness and eventually freezes. Had to use a pulaski to dig the traps out in Feb and they came out in frozen pucks of dirt the size of a bar stool. Had to beat them against trees to get the traps unfrozen.

Awesome tutorial!! Thanks for sharing!! Looking forward to seeing another big dog waiting for you there!

Top notch

Good tutorial Jumper...thanks for all the help you've provided me.

You running all yours on drags? Or are you staking any of your sets? Great pics and write up.

Sneaky - good question, was gonna write something up about anchoring for the next issue of the ITA magazine since it seems to be one of the more common questions folks have when getting started.

I use a little of everything - cable tie-offs, drags and earth anchors. The only one I don't use by itself is the earth anchor, but that's a function of the soils here. Soft duffy and loose wet soils, or decomposed granite - none of which I'm fully confident in holding an earth anchor. I use them, but always backed up with a drag or tied off as well. They generally hold, but I've had a few pumped out over the years, luckily they were backed up.

My primary go-to is 1/8" cable double ferruled on each end connected with two 3/16" quick links to the trap chain. I've never had a problem with these. They're quick and light but you need to have a tree next to set. I usually make them about 10' or so.

Alternately, I've been going to some bigger 8-10lb "drags", or portable anchors. The intent with these is making the set exactly where you want. These aren't necessarily designed to get the catch off the site like a lighter drag would do - but I'm not interested in chasing down a wolf on a drag before work or in the dark either. I'll use the smaller drags as a back-up to earth anchors. Most of the catches on these bigger drags are less than 10 yards from the original set, although my last took one about 150 yards across an old gravel pit/log landing. It made a 1" deep furrow the whole way and only made it a few feet into the treeline though. Biggest thing with drags is knowing if you've made a catch from a distance. More on that in the magazine.

Regardless of what you use, make sure you have a lot of swivels or at least a couple in the first few feet from the trap. On a longer chain they'll be tetherballed around brush or trees so making sure it's swiveled will keep they from getting too much leverage. Also - two quick links on your terminal connection is cheap insurance.

Couple quick pics:



Homemade anchor-drags compared to MB Trailblazer.

Updated with some remake pics. Just picked up this nice black female - almost 3 weeks after making the original set. I had been checking from a distance of about 40 yards and re-lured and shoveled the set out once during that time. Ordinarily I wouldn't even do that, but we had a freak dump of a snowstorm that was going to melt off quick, so I just helped it along to get it operational again.



Remaking set:



If I do have to visit a set in the snow I like to use a switch to beat out my tracks from the area - at least get rid of the airbob lug pattern. Not sure if it makes a difference from a wolf perspective, but gives me more confidence in the set.


Rest of the pack has still been hanging around the area - they came back thru two days after I caught this one. Just missed them at another set but I'm pretty sure they're going to stick around. No chance of getting snowed out for the next week or two, so hopefully I'll pick up another.

Nice catch there Jumper.

Awesome stuff!!!! Thanks for sharing!!

Thanks for the info. I’m battling freeze up in my coyote sets in NE Vermont also.

Thanks for sharing

Mac