Good morning and Happy New Year Trappers. Back on task building traps and even doing a little trapping. Went down South for the holidays visiting family and met with my new stamp company. Thanks for the offer of bail money Pete but didn't need it. Went rather well but still haven't seemed to get the who's responsible for paying for the extra made parts yet. Clean operation for sure but the shipping side of it sure could use some tightening up. Back up and running in the shop though putting in 10 hour days.
Did make it out on the line and got a little gear out. For some reason my get up and go got up and went not allowing me to get much gear out. I was kind of glad as we had some serious winds for a few days and would have put a bunch out of commission. Was happy to see lots of moose, caribou, grouse (Spruce, Ruffed and Sharptails), ptarmigan and good pockets of hares this year. Followed a big wolverine all the way up the creek. Seemed to be just covering country and not really marking or hunting. The wolves were doing the same thing, just covering country, no pee posts or splitting up hunting, running right down the creek. Left some pee posts out for them and hung a few snares. Didn't see much for marten sign at least not as much as I expected after not trapping them very hard last year.
1st shed of the season on the trail to Pee Post Pass. Saw a couple bulls still carrying antlers.
Not a lot of snow but deep in some places. Like here for instance where I spent the better part of an hour digging out .
Picked up this wolf pup the pack killed in the flats. A runt of the litter right on the trail. Thought it was a coyote at first until I saw the size of the paws.
The first check yielded a coyote caught in two snares. His partner was pretty savvy and chewed up of a snare.
Had a few days of beautiful weather and was able to work on the trail a bit.
Ended up picking up that wolverine in the Catch-all set with nothing but a Kill-Squeak for bait. Same set as I caught the 3 lynx on last season. Caught a lot of fur of this set but this old boy tore it up more than all the critters I'd caught combined,
31# old male wolverine. Real nice color for my trapline but pretty short hair.
Weather was getting bad so I bailed out of their. Wind picked up and drifted that new snow into some inconvenient places.
Happy to get out of there and back to the truck. Tanana crossing was great.
Got the ATA Fur Auction and Fling coming up quickly so starting to prepare for that . It is the Alaska Trappers Association's 50th Anniversary this year. It ought to be a good one for sure. Gonna start selling my blood, maybe some guns and some other stuff to get moneyed up for the Fling Auction. We have some really nice items this year. You all be safe out there this season