If you are trapping for marten and dont have any beaver meat for bait, what do you use for youre next choice? Thanks!

What Tatiana listed plus table scraps and fish scraps from processing.

Blueberry jam, or any jam works. anis oil, paddle fish oil, old seal oil, sardines, fish sauce, and the list goes on. Just about anything will work. Sometimes something new, that the marten has never smelled before will attract them. good luck

Thanks everyone!

Fish has always worked great for me especially if it's a little green. Grouse and duck carcasses work good too with a dab of lure. I saw a guy using those little cans of cat food with a hole drilled through it to run the wire, not sure how successful he was with it.

Any good sized chunk of meat that creates lots of activity around the set will work.

My first fisher was caught with a piece of squirrel hide that I tanned with the cheap orange bottle stuff. I just dabbed some marten lure in the fur. Just about anything should do. When my coworker had a line up north, all he used was fish guts in his marten sets.

Have used suet successfully when out of beaver meat.

Great info everyone thanks much!

I've used ground squirrels, whole or halved, bobcat meat, cougar meat, deer and elk meat scraps and beef scraps from a butcher shop, and skinned marten carcasses. Never had any luck with raspberry or strawberry jam, but back when I tried that I had no other bait and I had never caught a marten, while I set on marten tracks I did not choose good areas (out of a lack of knowledge) and never seen tracks come back through those spots while I had traps set there.

I use fish. last season I found out marten cant pass up bear meat

Ryan, have you used bear meat for wolverines much?

yes. for wolves too. I found that after a fall bear hunt the wolves or wolverine would stick around until the carcass was gone so i started taking meat for bait.

Good to know. Thanks. Black and brown bears? Or one or the other.. I have some bear fat/scraps/bones for this year.

As for marten attractants I've just used ptarmigan wings/carcasses and some anise/berry/skunky lure.

But admittedly catch them in my 330s more often than not.

Caught a marten on a chocolate chip cookie once.

My friend, the late Ben Hopson Jr, of Anaktuvuk Pass, in his never-ending (and sometimes futile...!) quest to try to drum into my brain some traditional ways to catch wolves in open country, introduced me to tainted grizzly fat as a premium wolf attractant.

Always experimenting, I tried it as well for marten and had some luck. I assume that black bear fat would also work.

Pete

A piece of tainted bear fat the size of your thumb best marten bait I ever used.

Chocolate chip cookies never made it to be bait with me, What a waste

Seal oil and jam helped back when I was seriously trapping. A visual is a good addition.

Get on a set of marten tracks and follow them. They'll go to and investigate any and all leaning poles. It's a way (underneath the leaning pole) for them to get access beneath the snow. Just the leaning pole, with no bait, is an attractant.

Jack

I had a short line in the western interior. I experimented endlessly with this line. IIRC, I had 24 conibear boxes with leaning poles. First box had no bait, second was Sable oil, third had Gusto, fourth had just a piece of grouse. Caught only 12 marten all winter, so not a real good test. There was no difference in catch rate between the 4 types of lure/bait. I've always used beaver meat (fresh) and had good luck in interior Alaska, S.E. Alaska, and in Idaho.

Jack