This thaw / freeze cycle is not fun but it looks like it will be consistently warmer over the next week or so

Set out 31 more muskrat sets and 3 beaver sets today. Checked yesterday's sets after that. 16 of 36. Was hoping for 50% but feel short. Had 3 misses. Nice day out there, my brother joined me too. Its fun sharing the experience with others when it works. Lots of tracks on the ice wolves, bobcat, fox,coyote, fisher, weasel, bear. Neat seeing all that.

Although it's far from the wilderness of the North, It's as close as I can get on a daily basis. Alot of folks outside of trappers never get a chance to experience it. It's Great!

Getting back on track

Deer fly just giving you a rough time:). Proud to see you carrying the proverbial torch.



They were worms long and thin like heavy hair, white to clear colored. Between the body and leather. Similar to the ones you see on coon legs. The mink looked good and solid

The thing that impressed me most was the number of wolves and cats. I’m mean every drainage! The must coexists well.

Looks like a lot of fun out there. Keep the pictures coming.

I am trapping with my camera this year. Gives me a much bigger trigger. Lol

I even caught a few animals in Winnebago county that I don’t get very often. We even had wolves make an appearance, so lots of them out there.

Well I checked the sets today. Yikes! not what I was expecting, but enjoyed the time out there
13 rats, 7 misses/fired traps, nothing in the 3 under ice 330's
Re baited 2 fisher boxes in hopes of there return soon. Placed 2 weasel boxes as well.

Nice catch Wild_Wi

I may or may not check the muskrat sets tomorrow, we'll see!

Good to see you have enough ice to travel on. We are not as fortunate here. Plenty ice formed on a lot of the river line Monday and Tuesday night but with near 50 here today with sun and above freezing last night and tonight most is gone. The walking ice we had a few weeks ago was that ice mixed with snow which is always weaker ice. Glad I got out of there b4 the last 2 warm stretches.

Bryce

I set a couple traps the other night hoping to get a couple volunteers for the fur handling workshop D5 has coming up in a couple weeks. This morning we had the first volunteer.

That is a real buffet Nimzy!
Pulled my bottom edge line today. Low catch percentage and still a lot to learn for me. Got 1 rat in a colony on a BE at a point. Interesting ice situation. Last Monday I set with no ice on these streams. Checked Wednesday and some open up to 1.5 inches of ice. Today anything in the sun and moving, no ice. Places where the sun did not hit and the water was deeper, still 1.5 inches of ice. Good time for me to finish putting up some fur.

Bryce

Got a tiny coyote line back out last weekend, finally got number 2 for the year. I'm just learning on canines, every day is a lesson for sure. Caught in a urine post flat set.

Good job K snow, it doesn't look rubbed at all, fun to see when you come up to them.

Guard hair wasn't rubbed at all. Underfur was matted a bit. She had plenty of fat on her.

Number 3 this morning

Nice Coyote catches guys!

Cool pic Nimzy

Crazy December weather! Checked and pulled one area of 24 traps this morning in the rain with my little guy. Catch wasn't great but we had fun, I believe this area was trapped open water so it was about what I expected.
We moved the 24 traps to a new location, looks promising. Another trapper in the distance enjoying his time out too. Unfortunately I didn't have enough traps with to make my way close enough to chat, maybe next time.

Ice is getting a little softer with the weather, this week's look to be nice but overnight temps should be able to keep up with the daytime highs

Probably check all tomorrow and set some more if it works!

Wife is on the board now with her fist catch

Thats a great first catch. Looks muddy by you too. We got over a quarter inch of rain today. Just when things were starting to dry out. Now it's gonna freeze a few days before warming up again.

Yeah it was cool she was excited, yeah this weather hasn't been fun hard to remake sets in all the mud

Looks like a good place to get wet nimzy.