What if you have consistent pictures or videos of coyotes aggressively digging at a set, but when used with a live trap the trapper isn't making catches? Is it the lures fault or the trappers fault? HAHAHA just kidding- I'm just saying that as a joke.

First I'll say probably 90% of my testing is without cameras.
Second of the guys I know and chat with that do regular testing all trap and are very good trappers by my judgment.
Third I haven't seen in my testing or from the guys I discuss testing with that the results seen while testing didn't generally correlate with the results while trapping.
With that said for me trapping is always part of the testing process. And it does take some experience to get a handle on what an above average reaction is while testing. And animals are individuals and some are more prone to be easier or harder to get to react to an odor. A good amount of reactions from different animals is always beneficial. I also do a large amount of side by side comparison testing to see what odor is preferred over another.
There's always the exception when animals are involved but the large majority of the time testing and trapping will yield the same results from my experience if your testing is done correctly.
I will say it is easier to get a coyote to work a test set than a trap set based off my experience. That's why while testing I'm not just looking for a reaction but a better reaction.

Do both and see what u see for results. Not to offend but your coming to a conclusion based purely off of thought not experience

You are right Yes Sir, I am not a lure formulator. I am a trapper. No offense taken at all, I appreciate the discussion. In fact, my catch has significantly increased since I drastically decreased my lure usage and invested in quality urine.

I also trust the word of some high volume guys which is why I don't have trail cameras out on lures. Once I stopped taking the advice of those with something for sale I started to see my catch expand

It benefits the trapper as much as the lure maker to test in an effort to find the best attractor. One learns a ton about the target animal besides what it likes to smell that will benefit a trapper while testing also. One also learns who knows what they are talking about and who may not know as much as they think which can shorten the learning curve for both the trapper and aspiring lure maker.

Yes, the camera will show the degree of desire by the coyote's body language to a scent. Just as importantly, it shows a natural foot placement with just the scent albeit a tuff of grass or a 1" hole as a point of guidance.

The testing of a scent is a time-saver before setting traps because there are a majority of lures & baits that are not attractive enough to create a high level of desire. All testing does is narrow the field and allows the trapper to use that lure or bait trapping with the knowldge it was attractive to some degree, hopefully a high degree. Back in 2019 if I would have not tested the "white" labeled lure I would not have known until I was trapping that something was wrong with it. At least every coyote that was on video wouldn't even acknowledge there was a lure there but the same coyotes would dig to China to get at the "yellow" label. How about the coyote gland lure that coyotes showed absolutely no interest in but bobcats couldn't get enough of it on them? Or the LDC lure that made the coyotes act like it was a gland lure? Those examples are only a few of the negative findings of a lot of lures & baits that I've tested. Why in the world would I want to spend my time, $$ using lures &n baits that are unattractive to coyotes?????

With me, that only allows that lure or bait onto my line. Once on the line I look for the "catch-to-set" ratio. Meaning I want to know objectively,, not the "I think so", "I know it's good", "I feel it's a good lure", etc. If I use a lure or bait or a combination at X number of sets, how many catches were made. As an example, if I made 2 sets with some lure and caught 1 coyote in 12 trap nights my catch ratio would be 1:2. This is not a satisfactory or acceptable catch ratio for me. The perfect catch ratio would be 1:1 but there are trash animals catches, weather, change of wind direction, etc, just a multitude of variables that are beyond the trapper's control. What I'm looking for in a lure or baits performance is a catch ratio around 1:1.2 which is using the lure or bait at 5 sets for 12 trap nights and catching 4 coyote. If a lure or bait's performance can only give me a 1:1.5 catch ratio or higher, it isn't acceptable to use on my line because it can't compete.

That is good information Seldom. It seems you have a system that works very well for you. The trap results as you highlighted here are very interesting to me. I enjoy quantifiable success

I guess what I am getting at is that I don't test lures because I don't use many lures. It took me awhile to learn the "secret" isn't in a lure bottle or even in a trap. It is in the trapper's work ethic, ability to read sign, and efficiency. Carrying a pail full of lures and making every set type under the sun, to me, is display of poor efficiency. I got into this game about 10 or 11 years ago and I was young and dumb. I read so many posts that said you have to use X,Y,Z lure and make 10 different set types to catch coyotes. I bought it all hook line and sinker and chased my tail for years. I had several seasons where I considered catching 12 or 13 coyotes to be a big success. Now I see I had it all wrong, and I listened to some of the wrong folks.

I keep a good record of my catches and bait choices. It would be interesting to me to use your formula to calculate their catch ratio. Thank you for that explanation

If you decide to use cameras or not, I pretty much don't care. They are a valuable tool and I use them the 7 months out of the year my state allows (don't get me started on the colossal ignorance that implemented the law limiting trail cameras). However, where I do get my panties in a knot is when a lure manufacturer makes claims about his or her lure that I know are based purely on speculation, good old-fashioned puffing, or genuine stretching of the truth because those claims are not tested objectively. Trail cameras are not perfect, and the interpretation of the animal's behavior can sometimes be subject to dispute, but they do allow you to see for yourself what the animal's reaction is the odor. This includes those times of the year that you can't or shouldn't have traps in the ground.

I have real mixed feelings on using cameras.

On one hand, when it all works you get to see a lot of behavior and response. Stuff you’d never see without a camera there.

On the other hand, and I havent used cameras in years for trapping, but 15 years ago, the cameras were a huge issue for coyotes, so right there you had a huge hurdle to overcome at a “set”. Loud shutters, visible flashes, shorter detection/trigger ranges, etc. Modern cameras have greatly improved and helped minimize a lot of that I think.

But then again, you have the added hurdle of adding the trap at an actual trap set. And of course, the real test. Dug up dirt smell, soft dirt pattern, perhaps some rust smell, and of course the human odor you’ve left behind is without a doubt a lot more than dabbing some test lure on a stick real quick and leaving. The point being, you could see a lot of positive responses with less going on (no trap) at a set.

I don’t test with a camera at all. All “testing” is done with a trap in front. Mainly, because I dont have time to test on coyotes without trying to kill them. When I find coyotes, I’m trying to kill them. I could hang a camera on live trap sets, but again, the goal is to kill those coyotes as quickly as I can, and hanging a camera on top of everything else is a potential risk that may hamper that effort.

That and I don’t have fancy cameras.

IMO, testing, with a camera or not, should be done with a hunk of iron in the ground as well.

Boone
I still have trouble with detection on new cameras. Both false trigger from vegetation moving in the KS winds and no trigger and missing coyotes working sets. Very frustrating for me. The coyotes detecting the cameras is almost a non issue with the cameras I use. Sometimes the first video of the night the lense filter makes a slight click I can hear. Sometimes the coyote will hear it and jump. But as stated it just the first video or pic of the night.
I test 90% with just dirt holes if they dig it and how much is how I gage what I got. If I'm building a formulation it's tested one ingredient at a time. Previous ingredients down one hole and formulation with new ingredient about a foot and a half away they normally are pretty clear which they like better. Each formulation or step is tested over multiple sites. I always worry when I send a formulation out to someone and they say they are going to put a camera over it. If they don't have much experience at this and don't have a good camera they could run into the issues you mentioned and think it the lure or bait and not realize it could be the camera

And I believe your 100% correct about the activity of adding a trap to a set making it more challenging. But for the most part I've found if you do comparative testing and have a good handle on what a good response is across multiple test sets and multiple animals my finding tend to follow what I see a while trapping as far as the quality of lure/bait. Or at the least be able to tell if it's in the bottom, middle or top third of formulations.

Oh, and I almost forgot another big reason I don’t mess with cameras anymore.

A severe lack of places to hang one in this country!

I’ve been testing lures & baits since 1971, just about every year in fact, it’s become a hobby. I feel some folks get sidetracked and/or either don’t have the same goal as I do. I have always had just one goal with testing, I only want to know the coyote’s reaction, degree of reaction, or lack there of reaction specificlly to a scent, be it a lure or a bait. I don’t want any more visuals or scents than what it takes to perform a test and the test protocol never changes so I do the same thing every single time.

Again, my entire focus of testing is the scent and the same with the coyote, I want nothing that would distract the coyote from the scent. Anything else done at the test site, visual or scented or added to it negates the entire reason of the test and contaminates the results actually making the scent test worthless. All variables need to be removed that I have control of!

I like a place to hang a camera without tall vegetation, camera pointed in a some what northern direction, close to a road and on a coyote hot spot. Harder to find here than one would think.

Boone u trapping coyotes year around full time gives u an edge over us wannabes

CD2, you may also be hung up on the term lure. The same can be done with bait and in my experience it helps sort the wheat from the chaff there just the same. If you are going to carry 1 bait in your bag would you rather it be the most attractive it can be, or not? All baits/lures will potentially catch some, but some will catch most. Regardless, watching a coyotes reaction to different baits will build confidence and you’ll know what to have in your bag. The big number guys are mostly still using a highly attractive bait. There’s a reason BW used RKs bait for so long instead of just cutting meat off his carcasses and shoving them down q hole. That’s my $.02 anyways

I see a lot of differing opinions and all have merit about cameras.
My thoughts are comparable with sighting in a gun with something like a lead sled. Yeah that gun ain’t moving and is rock solid as the earth. The only thing human involved is pulling the trigger. So now we KNOW that gun is dead on and any error is purely mine and mine alone…not the bullet, scope, or gun.

Same with that lure/bait. If it’s placed in 15-20sec and not a lot of human, trap, or disturbed dirt is present and it produces, then when a set is placed and it doesn’t produce, guess who’s to blame? It ain’t the lure/bait, lol. It’s all mine. I’d like to know a bait that produces for a big name trapper that has huge population to catch and miss is gonna work in an area with fewer coyotes to catch and miss.

I don’t use the video on cameras, can’t afford those, lol. I do use cell cameras that send “like real time” pics on some of my sets. Mainly use them to save time checking. They are generally not on “the line” and only have to hit them when a catch is made or I’m fairly confident a deer has tripped it (using urine).

What I’ve learned from them is patience. One coyote showed up on the first night and never broke stride. Only the initial pic which means he never showed an interest. The second night the same thing. I was getting antsy but the wind was still wrong. The third night the coyote came by and I thought, here we go again even though the forecasted wind was finally right. But then another pic of him at the set came. The third pic showed he was caught. Now how do I know it was the same coyote, I don’t really, but the landowner only had two coyotes on camera and one had been caught on night one in another trap on the main line. We never got another coyote pic anywhere on the property (fenced).

Had a coyote on another property come in and circled the dirt hole. I mean like 4 pics worth. Another coyote or the same one didn’t show for almost a week and did the exact same thing. I’m not the brightest, but I figured he liked something, but something was keeping it away. So I went out and put in another blind set by a pine cone she had stepped right beside each time. Five days later she showed up on a Sunday evening right after we had just got done eating. My son laughed when the first pic came in and said Ole Wiley is back. I laughed when the second pic came in and showed it caught already. Front paw in the blind set, rear paw in the dirthole set.

Now without a camera I’d have never known that coyote was anywhere around. Finding tracks in pine straw is a skill I haven’t mastered yet. We just have to set areas we “think” a coyote would use or whatever info the landowner can give us based on their pics. And when he sends us pics, I’ll put a set smack dab in front of his camera and about as close as I can guess where it had put its paw. It’s worked quite a few times, lol.

You are absolutely right, I want to have the most effective tool for the job. Instead of camera testing, I put in a little time to talk to some of those guys about which bait I should be using. Not the guys with something for sale, just the guys that kill coyotes for a living. It has worked out very well for me. Of course everyone has an opinion, but I have narrowed it down to 2 that I have lots of confidence in. Unfortunately one is being discontinued and I don't know of anything else like it on the market. We all have our different way of determining what is effective, mine did not involve cameras, but I'm glad others have had success with that approach. My coyote catch went up by almost 4 times what it was in previous seasons when I changed my approach and became more efficient.

Good points being made here, thanks for sharing everyone.

I don't do camera thing at all. But can see where they help.

Wanna Be. Landowners with cameras can be a great thing OR a terrible thing ! I had a highfence job once. 700 acres. Landowner had 30 cameras up. SWORE he had 20 plus coyotes inside the high fence. I told him = No dont. Ive looked. But he insisted. So me and his biologist Plugged = With Wire and rock. The ONLY crawl under on the place. I trapped 10 days got 7 coyotes. O pics on ANY game cam. Biologist = him = nor I could find a single track on place. Instead of saying he was wrong. He insisted = some how. The other 13 coyotes must have left. Maybe they climbed out over the 10 ft fence? This is why I NEVER,EVER Want to trap for small high fence in the south EVER again! Texas. Is the place for me

some old-timers boiled down hoof trimmings and caught coyotes--- I have too----- like it in the summer as an attractant, too much too close and they may roll on it---- set back with a flat set "guardiing" it works--- of course I have also used grasshopper based lures and sandhill plum based lures as well in the summer.