Who was the most influential person that got you started trapping and kept you a trapper all these years? Why do you still honor that person?

My beginning story is lame. I saw some traps on the shelf at the local scheels, and thought to myself, "i can probably do that." But I learned everything from the folks here at t-man. This place is THE source for trapping knowledge.

Back in 81 had a good friend I coon hunted with him and his dad also trapped so I took up with the ol man I was stuck to him like glue everyday after school and weekends makin every step he made read every trapper magazine he had over and over he mentored me well and also passed not only his knowledge of trappin to me but his traps when he passed I used those traps for years then I retired them they are special to me and like his lure box they are on display in my gun room / man cave I shure do miss that ol man that’s my story

Mine was my buddies father-in-law. That was forty-something years ago in Alaska. He took us out on a frigid winter morning to run his beaver sets along a river near Talkeetna. I'd run a few traps as a kid for coon but that trip is what really lit a fire under me and got the passion rolling. He's long dead and gone.

Yep, almost same beginning, saw some traps at combination lumber yard/hardware store. Bought 2 with lawm mowing money, I was 11 years old then …. Its been a while ago, I’m 76 years old. My first catch was a ferral house cat….that was a learning experience. I did’t know but a vague idea what and how to do it.
The set I made was: found a narrow tail in the woods, bent two bushes over the trail from opposite side and tied a dead bird above the trail….put trap in trail below and covered with leaves. Been hooked forever since
20 years ago while working at a paper mill a transfer employee from Oregon I met at a Safety meeting let it slip that he trapped beaver and bobcat in numbers from the Pacific Northwest. I asked if he’d mind showing me the tricks of the trade….he said he would with one condition. I’d have to listen and do it his way….and if Ii couldn’t do it his way…training would stop instantly. (He was a little rough around the edges, but maybe all you folks from up there are) We became great friends and still are. Thank you Sir

My best friend got some for Christmas one year and we decided we were going to be trappers. My BD is near the end of Jan so I got 6 Victor 1.5’s. That gave us 12 and a month of trapping season left. For the next 2-3 years we made more in 3 months than our Dads did all year. This was late 70’s to early 80’s. All trapping was done off bicycles and later a Honda 250 dirt bike. Don’t remember why we quit, girls I guess.

Fast forward 35+ years and I was voluntold I was gonna start trapping 2500ac. Believe it or not, I picked back up on it just like before and started making a little money again, lol. So my best friend still to this day is my mentor.

My dad from the time I could hold onto a pale on his back when he checked rat traps, he’s been gone 23 years and I’m now 60 and have never missed a season

Self taught, me and my buddy when we were 11-12 years old
I have taught many people to trap since then. Just recently my 8 year old great granddaughter
I pay homage to FUR-FISH-GAME and Mother Nature. That was my teacher and reference material

this guy taught me, along with Bob G. and The other Bob

A natural born instinct to be close to nature and learn about it close up. S. Stanley Hawbaker and Fur- Fish-Game magazine took it from their. Long list of trappers since I was a boy.

No one in particular got me started into trapping. But one year after deer season ended I was sitting at home unemployed wishing hunting season never ended. I wanted to be in the bush more and needed a reason to.

I googled if trapping was still legal in Manitoba, and the Manitoba trapping guide and Trapperman website popped up. I read the guide and started reading Tman, and the following winter I began trapping.

Copy and paste from a old post I wrote a while back



So not the best at starting off stories but this happens to me today and figured alot of y'all could relate.
Backstory is I used to live with my grandparents ,they where only like 10min form my parents and I able to help with the cows and stuff. Anyhow them being older there where always some interesting folks coming by. Either to talk business cows with my granddad or church stuff with my grandma ,just lots of older fairly intresting folks. Well probably one of my favorite people to see pull up was someone who may grandma said was my Uncle. Name was Blue-Bebly. Dont know if I'm spelling that right but that's what what we called him. Not Blue ,or uncle Beb or something , it's was Blue-Bebly ,had to say the whole thing like a Rolls-Royce. Anyhow he was my favorite because every time he pulled up I got to see critters. See my uncle was a trapper. And me being the nappy headed ,bb gun toting woods running 7yr I was I love it when I saw his rickety old truck pull up to the house. I remember how he'd drop his tailgate and he'd have like 15 cage traps stacked up. And usually each and everyone of them would have a raccoon or a possum a grinning or growling.
See he basically was a live market trapper for coon and possums. He'd trap em around the local creeks and he'd drive to the folks he sold em to drop the tail gate and let them pick which ones they wanted . Then the men folk would either take the cage round back and *pew pew * if it was a coon or he'd just break their necks if it was a possum. Grandma also told me he had a big "coup" ( apparently a coup and a coop are two different things ) where he'd keep anywhere from 10-30 or so racoons and possums and "feed them out on corn and fresh water for a better price. Apparently it was kind built like how cages one a mink farm kinda are.
Anyhow being the kid I was constantly waiting the crocodile hunter and hunting shows I thought it was the coolest thing ever. He'd always laugh and pick at me and say he'd give me one of them traps one day. Well one day he pulls up and had one of those little battery powered toy truck I was playing it , moving chicken feed, and I pull to the truck to look at the critters same as usual. He was dropping a dressed coon in a buck for my grandma when he saw me. He laughed as I got out and said " well looks like you got a truck now ! Reckon I can finally give you this and save your grandmamma some money ! " He reached in the back and slid out a old school Havahart cage trap. These where the older one back where they where still being built kind a heavy like. He hand it to me on two fingers and the second I grabbed it he let go and me being weak as I was I near about doubled over Lol. After he got done laughing at me he put it on the back of my little truck and pulled a zip lock back outta his coat pocket. Was full of muscadines and wild black berries. I remember him just saying " I can tell your pretty bright nephew, you can learn to set that trap by your self no problem. Go by some water find you some tracks , set that cage but some of these on the out side to get em started in and some more in the back over the trigger and you'll keep ya grandma and granddaddy's freezer full haha !"
After that I'd haul that ole havahart all over the farm . I caught idk how many possums and coon, one of my favorite things was to try to and figure out which way they where coming to the chicken pen and set it with no bait so they basically just stumbled in. Heck I end tried catching sliding turtles in the pond by tying a watch work over the pan and birds by sprinkling bird seed in it. Those two never really worked lol. The 30 odd barn cats we had sure got annoyed with me constantly catching and releasing them in it. Got to the point some of them would just kinda slowly walk out and streach when I let the door up lol.
Yeah didn't see to much of uncle Blue-Bebly after that. To this day not sure what happened to him... Anyway. After Grandma died a few years back my parents moved over there to care for the farm and stuff and I got the old house . Was over there today checking the hay and feed , counting cows and such when something told me to look under the platform we stack the feed. Sure enough, was my old cage. Still sturdy as ever, springs are slowed down to about nothing but there she is. Part of me wants to fix her back up. Paint it new springs and the like....but , I don't know something in me says , leave it as is and where is at, at least for now.....

It was my grandfather "Pop" DiSalvo and my father.Yes, I still honor them and make sure to make a few sets just like they showed me when I am out on the line. Also last year would have been Pop's 100th birthday, I had ms Sharon do a personal project for me.

Drawing of Pop, Dad, my old partner Arnold Favinger and myself - here is Dad on Christmas Day with it

Picked up a ad card at a bait shop in IL for the Trapper paper at the time that was out of NE it all started there.

What some great memories and people that has kelp our heritage alive. I applaud each of you for sharing your beginning and the ones that shared their lives and passion with you.
Y’all keep them coming….a book could be written on this.

My brother and I taught ourselves to trap muskrats in the late sixties and later ran a landline on our bicycles before and after school. We trapped during the last big fur boom. We had lots of competition from adults, some of them less than honest in their dealings with two kids.

In my teens I discovered girls and cars and that was the end of trapping for me for a while.

Fast forward a few decades and I was taking my daughter to my camp for PA's Youth Doe Hunt. A guy that owned the camp nearest mine was a trapper and we became good friends. I took my daughter over there to visit one day and Marlyn was working in his fur shed. My daughter was fascinated and immediately asked me when we could start trapping.

I dusted off the old traps, ordered supplies and by the next season we were running a fox line in around home in southeast PA and a fox/coyote line around camp a week each year in north central PA.

Thank you Mr. Messersmith RIP



Marlyn saw my truck at a local eatery while heading back to his camp after running his line one day. He stopped in to show me his morning's catch. I got a buddy to snap a pic. This one and the one above are the only two pics I have of him.

I was being ornery in study hall in the 7th grade. The librarian ( Miss Conn) an old person lol in 1969. She said I needed something to read to keep me out of trouble, so she gave me a fur fish game to read. That night we were at a dept store that sold traps. I bought 3 #1’s. And that’s when it started.

My grandfather, who trapped in the 20's, 30's, 40's, then came out of retirement in 1974 to teach me how to trap.

Expert blind set man, never used bait or lure...Only guide sticks, urine at times, never used dirt covering & could regularly catch the old dog fox with worn down teeth.

Made his own wood stretchers with a draw knife, skinned on a hay hook & fleshed with a Case muskrat pocket knife....He was a Ironworker, wore denim Duckhead bib overalls, smoked camel non -filters, and chewed Mammoth Cave twist.

Good stories folks . Wolffie I really liked that .

I read a lot of mountain man books as a kid. Got rides to my cousins and we taught our self to hunt but not knowing anything about trapping and i only had the weekend and thet was spent hunting i didn't start trapping tell i was in my early 20s living in the country and had the ability to run a small line . Found out about a local trap selling fur buyer and picked up a dozen Duke 1.5s and he told me some basic sets. Took 3 to 5 days to get that first coon but after that I was hooked.