I’ve wondered about this a lot. Then I watched the video called Combines and Coyotes. Randy something-or-another did it about 10-years ago. Anyway, he’s wearing coveralls and they have to smell to high heaven. Most of it’s coyote stink, but I imagine there are other smells there as well. As I recall, he doesn’t change traps after a catch. He’s skinning on the line so he’s being exposed to blood, internal juices, etc. I gotta believe there are fear ‘elements’ in those liquids and he’s taking them to every set he makes/remakes.

I make my snare sets by kneeling on the ground. My scent is on the ground, albeit briefly. And I catch fur.

So, I think the whole scent control paranoia is just that. Go out there. Make your sets on good locations and stay back from those locations. If the critters are in the area, and catch wind of your set, you’ll have a good chance of catching them.

Human scent does have an impact on the coyotes at a set for the most part. How much human scent an individual coyote will tolerate and still work the set is influenced by several factors and varies from individual to individual. But there's no way to eliminate human scent completely and you just have decide in your own scenario is the reward worth the effort to reduce some of your scent. Sometimes its hard to know what you dont know. Its not always just about working (making a catch), sometimes its about being more effective (improving ur catch rate).

I think there is a big difference in coyotes response to human scent in areas where they smell it daily versus areas where they rarely smell it. I also think coyotes that have experienced something bad, like a pack member being trapped, and they smell human there, will be more wary when they smell that scent again. Yes, I do believe coyotes recognize the scent of individual humans. They may have little fear when they smell Farmer Brown for the thousandth time but go on high alert when they smell Trapper Joe.

I do not believe you can set a trap without leaving your scent there. But you can take steps to greatly minimize it. It may mean the difference between first night catches versus a catch days later when your odor dissipates sufficiently. Or it may be that you will never catch a particular educated coyote in that set if he detects your odor there the first time he visits it.

Whether it is worth it to practice strict scent control probably depends on your goal of what coyotes you want to catch. It you have a lot of trapping ground and want to catch the easy ones (naive pups or bold ones) and move on to the next area,, and repeat to take the cream of the crop, I wouldn't get crazy with scent control.

If you are trying to kill every coyote in an area or particular problem coyotes you better get religious about scent control. And you probably should mix in snares, blind sets and calling or ambush shooting while you're at it.

I think Mr.Dan hit the nail on the head. I don’t worry much about it. Besides, I don’t know of a way to keep scent at a minimum in the South anyways. Thankfully most of my properties have somewhat of a constant human presence. Besides, what I can’t catch, I’ll call in and dispatch and vice versa.

Biggest thing I do as far as scent control is having a pair setting gloves.
And another pair for adding my bait and/or lure.

Always start the day with a new or clean pair and yesterday's dirty setting gloves,
Become bait gloves.
Use wash able black dot gloves.
Our than that never worry about anything else. Just go trap.

I would tend to agree although I take scent precautions but don't lose sleep over scent control. Caught a coyote in a skunk set I made this year. Bare hand setting a 1.5 coil using shrimp tails that I had eaten the shrimp out of. I also agree with the mentions of them being wary of scent in areas they aren't used to it or of a new individual person's scent.

Barnhurst is spot on from my limited experience.
I would like to sit in the truck and watch some one else set a few of my properties and see the response. I am pretty sure they remember me even after 3 or 4 months.
I can catch 3 or 4 from a place with 6 - 8 sets and everything quiets down. I will pull everything because of time constraints and they will move back in and become steady customers on the cameras. I will come back a few months later, reset and maybe pic up 1 and the cameras show no movement across the 300 or so acres while I'm there. I have been lazy in my approach thinking my old tactics would continue to produce results. I will be trying again in a few days with better sent control and different sets.
Game on, you butt sniffers

Not much I can add that hasn’t been said.

I’m a firm believer in scent management. It WILL put more coyotes in the dirt, faster, the real question is how many. Some places a lot, some not so many. Certain times of the year it’s more important than others. Certain situation, etc.

Every exploited animal out there has a threshold of human intrusion it’s willing to accept as safe.

The more careful I am in my approach towards my scent and intrusion at a location (drop clothe, clean gloves, deliberate and efficient action doing what I need to do, etc) the more coyotes I catch, the faster I catch them, and the less “issues” that arise in catching them.

Everything said above is pretty accurate from my experience. If you are trying to catch numbers there comes a point of diminishing returns where you spend more time trying to reduce scent instead of getting more sets in. You have to figure out where that happy medium is for the coyotes you are trapping.
If after a particular Coyote or pack that you know are educated it may be totally different and a set or two made Very carefully will outperform more sets.

Also keep in mind that time spent at a set adds scent, so less time equals less scent. And if you are after a particular educated individual setting several days before you expect him to come through and allowing time for what scent you did leave to dissipate before he arrives can be advantageous.

You cannot control scent, only limit it

A coyote knows you were there for at least a period of hours, 3 days later they may not be able to smell you were there.

The less scent you leave initially, the sooner they can no longer smell you.

That is my opinion

It’s interesting everybody talks about coyotes. Right now, other than for paid removal, there doesn’t seem to be a market for them. And it may be years before there is.

This forum offers a place for people to learn. Those of us who are hobby trappers vs professional (those making a substantial portion of their income trapping) have a forum on this site. I’ve learned a lot coming here. But I’ve also learned to separate one-offs from experience. Just because it’s written on Tman, doesn’t make it applicable in every situation.

I think people mainly talk coyotes when it comes to topics like this because they’ve become the dominant canine throughout most of the country save for a few pockets of good fox numbers anymore.

I think when you ask about scent control, everybody assumes coyotes unless you specify otherwise. I have no real experience with fox, but from what I've read and heard it sounds like they are pretty dumb/easy to catch compared to coyotes or wolves. Anything said about scent control for coyotes applies in spades to trapping wolves, at least in this part of the country where they get a lot more trapping pressure than coyotes do. I specifically said coyotes because most of you on here either don't have or can't trap wolves, but you can substitute wolf for coyote in my reply and it is every bit as true. Scent control is not nearly so important with non-canines.