I was getting $8 a rat,$10 for blacks.And money from one rat would pay for my gas for the days entire line check.I always said rats are my potatoes (pay all my expenses).Money from all them high dollar canines,,beaver,,mink and coons is the gravy.That was back then of course.

Enjoyed t reading this Peeler!!

Congratulations. I wish you could get those carcasses out this way, the bear hunters would sure buy them.

You're good North! Exactly right, blown compressor and since it was only 4 years old the tech figured it was likely a power surge.

As far as the castor goes it was Willamette river stuff where the predominate forage is cottonwood in the winter months. Cottonwood equals light colored creamy yellow castor.

Yes, the update did factor in to my willingness to take another chance going the FHA route. New since the last time I shipped 20-25 years ago was the "western select" grade which I figured my stuff would grade a high % into. At any rate I went into eyes wide open and was willing to take a small amount of castor to find out. The other thing was I didn't know castor was going to hit $40 in the association sales. (I'd been hearing low 20's to mid 30's). If I'd known that I likely would have opted to sell it all at the association sales.

All this talk of good profits and great fur prices "back in the good old days" has me reminiscing. I know I have had what I consider exceptionally profitable (for me) days on the trapline, over the last few fur booms. That made me curious as to how much profit is considered "a good or great day" to other trappers. I think I can pinpoint what was most likely my most lucrative day ever, out of all my decades of trapping. It definitely wasn't my best single day catch for quantities on fur bearers, just a good numbers day, during a HIGH prices year. Does anyone else remember some of their "great days" total values, past or present, and care to share??

For me my best years were while I was in College and nutria were averaging $12-13. If only I had the equipment and know how back then that I do now! My gold standard back then (late 70's early 80's) was $100 a day.

Would I be guessing correctly that among your best days were just before the Dalai Lama said he was embarrassed to see his people sporting otter prayer shawls?

I'm actually mostly a marten trapper, but the end of the widespread use of otter fur in Tibet did hurt a bit.
I've been fortunate to live in an area of high abundance for a few higher value species....
My best single day for profit, actually came well after the demise of the Tibet otter market. I haven't tried figuring in adjusting for inflation back to the fur boom days in the 1980's, since that would require to much higher math!!
When you figure in inflation, some of those days in that boom were pretty good too!!

Then the power company will have to compensate and they will have the records. Hopefully you have the compressor (= 15 pounds of Cu@ 5$ pound) if they want to see it. Surge or brown out and over heating

My best days were when rats boomed in 2011 or 12 and averages were over 12$ = $ 1000.00 days for 14 days

Where I am,on a multi species line with marten avg around $100 like they are now and around 80 boxes out and with other fur prices climbing,check days on one Rtl should be $800 to $1200 in normal pop years.Operating 3 RTLs you would run each twice a week on avg.
Some do more lines on longer checks and others less.
I only run two RTLs now and not many traps and run each once a week in winter.
main thing is keeping expenses down by not checking empty traps.
Lots of different types of traplines,single species,multi species,long duration,short duration long lines,short lines Beaver lines and high ground lines
multi season acess and winter only acess and on and on.

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Then the power company will have to compensate and they will have the records. Hopefully you have the compressor (= 15 pounds of Cu@ 5$ pound) if they want to see it. Surge or brown out and over heating

My best days were when rats boomed in 2011 or 12 and averages were over 12$ = $ 1000.00 days for 14 days[/quote]

Those high price rat years were fun. I have no rats anywhere near me, but was still trapping the interior of the state in the Fall, back then, and made a few days excursion just to trap some of those high dollar rats. Fun days of camping, canoeing, trapping, shooting rats, and skinning around the camp fire. I even made a few bucks too

It sounds like you are speaking in Canadian dollars, so now it has turned into a math problem for me!!
I was actually curious more about like epic all time great financially successful days, than the average runs. Maybe I do it wrong, but I'm usually setting or checking traps every day of the main season, that the weather allows me to get out. Do each of your RTL's have a maximum quota for species like marten, lynx, otter, etc??

On marten fisher lynx and beaver baseline quotas only on one of the 3 grounds I manage.Of the other two,one is open quota on Beaver,and the other is open quota on everything.I set my own quotas regardless on all 3 grounds for the keystone species in order not to harm the line by either underharvesting or overharvesting them.
But quotas when in place are specific to each rtl,but no limit on amount of rtls you can trap,except your physical ability.
I used to run many lines on weekly checks when I was younger,never check the same trapline each day.Take one day a week off to skin.
Each line would be checked once every 7 days in winter since all sets are lethal.
I only trap 3 rtls now because of my age.
I produced a lot more fur when I was younger and held down a full time job at the same time, than i do now that i am retired with more time.
I thought I would be able to trap like a maniac once I took my pension from the railroad unfortunately things dont work that way.
I do keep in the fur game though by trapping, tanning,designing and sewing fur articles the latter being much easier,on the old joints and often more lucrative than trapping full bore.

Two or 3 RTLs

You are trapping smarter, not harder!! Aging can be, and is frustrating, but we all might as well enjoy whatever we can still get out and do! I was hoping to hear more stories of high value catch days, just out of curiosity to see how what I considered to be some of my GREAT days, stacked up to others stories of their good old days!

I run two - Driftwood and Agate and trap on the a Native line (Adnac)as a designate,mostly nuisance and in fall.(That is why the beaver quota is open on that one)

Each season there are always one or two days that are extraordinary,I remember a few multispecies days in the 2g + range.10 years ago or so when marten and otter were good and cats and beaver fair.
i am sure you must have had a few 10g+ checksT4E with the amount of fur you have shown on here.
I am just talking about raw fur prices,not the prices realized by value added goods.(Still have many great returns on those) .

T4ever those early spring rat averages 12$usd converted to 16$ Cnd and the rat run days were 100+ animals per day.
Mb coonguy posted here some of his doing some large rat runs in the fall on floats of 2425 in 16 days before a early freeze up $$$$$$
and some guys say floats dont work

Since I don't check traps everyday, they are not really daily catches. I have multiple lines that get checked in order. They also get set in order of freeze up. Freeze up occurs at different times in different areas. It is a slow accumulation of wealth. Weather is always the issue.

P.S, I'm getting too old for this crap!