Good post.

Mac

Man I love when you post these cat threads every year. Sure is cool to see the efficiency

I was wondering if Oregon had a visible bait law. Thanks for clearing that up.

I love seeing those cat pictures. Four cat day, good by any standards. Thanks for showing us.

Sure, love your cats if you get any ugly belly ones let me know

They would never be mistaken for those high dollar cats you get but for here it was an excellent day. One of the four might be the best cat I've ever caught. I've never had a cat over $300 but this one might have a shot at that.

That is some efficient trapping. Nice haul!

Beaverpeeler we have been trying to get a Tom cat on the west side of Oregon weighing 25 pounds are we fooling ourselves. Do they get that big ? Best that we caught so far was a female at 18 pounds.

Very few get that size. More likely to get a bigger one in the Cascades than the Oregon coast. I weighed one of my males from this go around and it weighed 21 lbs. A friend of mine got a 35 lb male in the Cascades two years ago. He said it was the biggest he'd ever caught. And of course, if they've pigged out on beaver several of them momentarily could go 25 lbs...but wouldn't be legit.

They do, but they are rare there. I would catch one or two honest thirty pounders there a year when I used to hunt it. But that was out of 40-50 cats. Get in the cold country, high Cascades or east side and they tend to bulk up more, then move into the desert and they lean back up, even high desert where it gets cold they tend to be much leaner and not as heavy as timber cats. 18 is a real big coastal female, here she would just be average, I've caught females here that weighed 25 or better.

These are just my observations, no scientific data to back it up, just my observations from hunting bobcats my whole life across several states.

I should specify that most of my biggest "west side" cats came from the Cascades, they are much rarer west of I-5.

Good contribution there bearcat. Coincides with my observations.

Thanks for sharing your knowledge.

So you were in valley trapping west slope of cascades

Nice haul.

Those cats that BP caught may have weighed more than that with those bellies! Lol

good read thanks for sharing,

Thanks for sharing Carl. We have a discussion going on now on the use of beaver/ beaver meat and its overall attraction on another thread. The question of whether beaver meat is a good bait came up. I tried my best to explain thru my experience how effective it is.

I would think that your post will help some to understand and see the results of its attraction to most all predators and the other opportunists in the wild.

I have found it to have great attraction for all predators straight and it really jumps out if blended with other materials. It has become our most preferred bait by many trappers over the years.

Not only a good success rate as far as number of critters caught verses number of sets made You havea nice mixed bag And they are some really great looking fur Like some one else noted Your locations and methods would make it a high population seem to be a very good fur producing area And you have developed a system that helps you make the best use of your time and resources Great job And those cats are some pretty pretty pretty looking examples that do not happen as often as we would like them too Thanks for the sights and insight

The dude is a stud,,,,, if he wasn’t ugly I would use him in my adult movie production….