You’ve touched it some there Boco but out of context. I thought I was “remote” but I’ve watched it disappear. All over Minnesota it has disappeared. “Non built up areas” have stretched the tentacle’s where I never thought it would be, statewide. This is the core to the frustrations coming out here. This is not a chastisement.
For me I do not have a dog in the fight. I am not interested in spending the time and effort on what’s rightly termed trophy animals with sparse limits. I’ve caught em all at least once, trophy trapping done. They are there for others.

Osky

I couldn't have said it better myself.

Dirt, no maybe about it, it's you. I hate to even begin to think how much I spend fishing every year and that is not including the place at the lake. If a guy wants to spend a grand to catch a fisher who cares.

Osky in 1980 we had roughly 225 million people in this country, we are laying pretty hard on 335 million now. In the same time frame Mn went from 4.1 to 5.7 million. It isn't going to get better.

Then ban lethal sets. Put that last nail in the coffin dead 23 hours or 72 hours. What’s the difference?

Osky. I agree about trophies. To me a beaver, mink and muskrat are the trophies.

We have a lottery here to just put in for a cat or fisher tag. I bought a candybar with that money. When we could trap trophies I usually ended up taking them incidentally on the production line. Time was valuable in those days. Unfortunately they are what this craft has been reduced to.

Time is valuable every day, in fact it's the only finite commodity we have.

For many it's a tradition along the lines of deer camp.

You’ve touched it some there Boco but out of context. I thought I was “remote” but I’ve watched it disappear. All over Minnesota it has disappeared. “Non built up areas” have stretched the tentacle’s where I never thought it would be, statewide. This is the core to the frustrations coming out here. This is not a chastisement.
For me I do not have a dog in the fight. I am not interested in spending the time and effort on what’s rightly termed trophy animals with sparse limits. I’ve caught em all at least once, trophy trapping done. They are there for others.

Osky[/quote]

Then ban lethal sets. Put that last nail in the coffin dead 23 hours or 72 hours. What’s the difference?

Osky. I agree about trophies. To me a beaver, mink and muskrat are the trophies.

We have a lottery here to just put in for a cat or fisher tag. I bought a candybar with that money. When we could trap trophies I usually ended up taking them incidentally on the production line. Time was valuable in those days. Unfortunately they are what this craft has been reduced to.
[/quote]


Really there is no need to ban anything-trapper education is key so trappers know how to set ethically.
Of course nothing is 100% but due diligence and following trapper ethics goes a long way to protect the industry.

The very best thing about lethal sets and extended checks is the ability to run more lines and check far less empty traps which minimizes expenses.
There are plenty of lethal sets that are safe to use,in certain locales.new trappers just need to be made aware of what,when and where things work and what doesnt.

Just because a set is legal doesnt mean it should be used under certain circumstances.
For example when trapping nuisance beaver in a city park where dogwalkers are present every day,only a few sets will be safe to use although many may be legal

It's not about Money

Boco. The direction things are going I do heavily agree on the education needing to he imroved. I feel like with our current climate, a path of having apprenticeships similar to falconry, or stricter testing would be an improvement on the dog incidents.
I'm mainly trying to find a way to help prevent having to lose methods of take and trying to solve the problem.
There's not many incidents but they are all a black eye.

Amen

Boco you are absolutely right.

Don't tell him that out loud!

He's probably being sarcastic,lol.

True. But if you ever handle a good prime marten and a good prime mink, there is no comparison. Marten fur is so much thicker and softer it is unbelievable. At least good marten. We don't have a lot of marten here locally but of all the ones I've caught the few I sent to international auction were graded with the Alaska/Canadian marten. Of course I tend to trap them later in the season, from now to the end of January, so that also helps. I have seen marten at fur sales that looked and felt much thinner, more like mink, I'm not sure if it was the area they came from or the time of year they were caught. But it made me realize why they pay double for Alaska/Canadian marten if they are representative of lower 48 marten.

Nope to sarcasm. The use of discretion goes far.
A bit facetious on a ban though.

Often times we do stupid things and call them solutions. Here’s an example. I think it’s Manitoba that doesnt allow winter muskrat trapping because some fool didn’t close the huts

In Wisconsin we trap all winter and can’t open a hut.

Yup got that sorta right Nimzy. but make that plural fool's, and they were going into a closed area and high grading and running, can you imagine if they went into Hurrican marsh and did that

research has shown that it takes 3 rats to keep a house open when the weather is -15c so the season lines up when day time temps do not go below that, around 1 March locally here

Back to this fur bearer season. Lets hope when the data comes in they ( Minn Trappers Assoc) can liberated the season lengths and possession limits

John, that research doesn't align with my real world experience.

Also I don't expect we'll see any change in our season length and limits for some time yet.

Tru dat! And any changes will most likely be more restrictive.

I’ll continue to reminisce in the good old days of trapping

That makes it even more ridiculous.