Let the dreams begin. Good luck to all who trust in the process.

Wish I had a couple of dozen wolves to sell. Looks to be selling pretty well.

They're moving along faster this time. The 2nd auctioneer is quick on the hammer which is good. Lets the bidders know not to screw around.

The little section I watched just now black wolves were selling for about $120 over valuation. Always a good sign.

Yee Haw,Fur prices set to skyrocket to the moon.
BP I hope you support the felt market by buying a bunch of stylish fedoras.I hear the latin ladies just swoon for a sharp dressed beavertrapper with a fedora.The bogart look is back.

They are breaking for lunch after page 30 of the wolves. 8 more pages to go.

Averaging 7.5 pages of wolves per hour. Slow going. But each wolf sells by itself. No string lots here. LOL

So at least another 4 hours to get through the rest of the lot quantity 1 items......

I figure it will be about 6 PM eastern time before they get to skunks, etc.

Wolverine and bear are all 1 pelt per lot. 8 pages of wolves. 14 pages of wolverine.. 15 pages of bears. BORING. Even if you are bidding it is slow going.

Some may think it’s boring to others. It is interesting. I’m sure that Canadian and Alaskan trappers find it very interesting.. seems to be a pretty good payday. At least to us lower 48 coon trappers.😂

Glad you find it interesting. To those of us that have sat through several hours of auction with not enough money to participate, it is very boring. I’ve been there.

That would be painful Wissmiss. I’m checking in occasionally from my couch. Giving away cheep bears now.

Bears for less than 70 bucks?

Some of those cheap bears are badly rubbed. Only good thing on them are the 20 claws!!

Why would someone shoot a badly rubbed bear? Unless you’re just meat hunting.

Meat hunting. Depredation bear that is causing problems and can’t be relocated. Didn’t realize it was rubbed when they shot it.

All the bears at FH are Canadian, none coming from the US

Maybe cuz there's too many? I'll tag one no matter the size or quality before June 14th. Then I'll put it up and send it in just to see what I get.
If you don't enjoy the amount of work it is, it would suck......but I don't care.....lol
FINALLY on to Grizzlies! And they ain't movin too good.

Skunk prices are down. Still a fair amount of interest

Be interesting to know what the type of dressed fur they are selling. I know they started with a couple lots of nutria

The 2 lots of nutria were raw.

Dressed goods started with 4 pages of beaver.

There are 5 pages of dressed nutria father in the catalog.

I see Thanks

Once again, possums fail to get the respect they deserve.

Thank God there's still men around that will stand up, holding a banner high in respect of our lovely native marsupial. Good on you!

NAFA would have given a trapper a $18.00 hat for that Top Lot $3.50 opossum!

I sold 27 grinners for a total of $9.00. And 2 skunks 1 for $24.00 and one for $18.00. I have some coyotes and some rats and coon yet to be sold.

Your gonna be a rich man Gary.

Beav - you should know by now that those Wisconsin grinners aren’t worth skinning. LOL

I tried to watch some of it live when I was at work and it seems that the market is a bit softer than what they expected. For both the Badgers and Skunks, they had to lower their asking price quite a bit just to get the bidding started. I don't recall it being that way in March. I went thru all my fur and looked up the prices for the same grades from the march auction and the skunk prices were off about 15% from March and the top lots were closer to 20% lower. Even the Ermine, they couldn't get a bid on the 1X-LG Selects and asked the buyers what they wanted to pay and there was basically no bidding with multiple buyers getting lots at the same price.

I am hopeful for everyone that there is more active bidding tomorrow on the common items with prices comparable to March.

Schmattz

Buyers want what they want. If you have fur on day three you'll probably be happy.

Ya Miss Nancy but I just can't toss any critters I've caught. But I had 32 grinners and gooney bought 5 at $5.00 dollars each. I offered the other 27 for .50 cents each and he didn't want them. I should have seen the writting on the wall.

Skunk prices were still very good. You skunk trappers got spoiled last season with an $80.00 average. Pelt, essence, skulls - still worth a decent amount of money.

Ermine prices, still respectable. IMO

Just a grading question. Not all of my beaver are trapped many are shot. Is this why my beaver some of my beaver are DGD ?

What did you shoot them with, and where did you shoot them?

I have always thought shot beavers grade better since don’t have a 330 knocking any hair off

Skunk prices are similar to what was being paid in the country this season.

lol……75% of the shippers got awards.

Could be a pile of different reasons.
Here’s a good grading vid……
https://www.trapper.ca/cnta/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=16149


If your traps taking hair off, that’s a late beaver……..unless it’s pulled out of the ice and freezes instantly. Gotta pull it out of the steel while it’s in the water under the ice.

My fur so far is about what I thought. Skunks down a bit, ermine level, squirrels up 150%…….. and wolves are wolves.
Big day today!

Beaver time in 15 minutes. Good luck to all !

22mag in the head. Seems more damage when swimming away from me.

Top beaver $86 USD lots 005-013

Hatter market was strong with the GD DMG stuff selling for 1X $37, LG $31, LM $24, MD $17 all USD.



Top otter was in the $90's seems majority are selling.

you may have noticed I predicted a higher price for squirrels

I don't think the overall average is up 150%, but my average is.......lol
Pretty Slick eh?

These Grizzly's are the worst collection of bears that FHA has had in a long time. Last sale they had nice bears.

Almost all beaver that are shot, end up graded as some sort of damage, unless you shoot them in front of the ears.

We can't shoot beaver here in WI.

The blanket Gd Dmg mostly sold for $37, first few lots @$38. In March all the blanket hatters went for $43. It would appear that that market is starting to soften a little.

The better grades of beaver seem to have done at least as good as March and maybe a little better.

Sure didn’t take long to sell 80,000 muskrats. sounded like 100% sold.

That sucks beav.
One of my favorite is beaver hunting,Did lots of beaver hunting on the river back in the day in springtime after ice out,plus its a great way to wrap up some nuisance problems quick and a good way to eliminate trapshy beaver quickly.For fur I use a 22mag and for nuisance a 12ga with buckshot or a high power rifle.
Headshot beaver should not be a dmg grade.
A lot of beaver will grade dmg from old scars clips etc nothing that a trapper has done in harvesting or handling.
One of the worst things I see often is trappers pulling big beaver out of the water or carrying or hoisting them up holding the 330.Almost guaranteed to pull fur out especially big heavy beaver.
Weak traps also cause that kind of fur damage.

When the auctioneer says….” Are we continuing?”, what is he referring too?

I think that would be asking the buyer if he wants to buy more similar lots in the same string at the same price. Every pound of the gavel is one lot sold.

I had my 2025 spring beavers on the sale. 42 total. All in, smalls to bigs. About half went in the hatter pile, no real fancy ones.

I followed my lots on you tube, so I may be off a few bucks. But should be close.

I averaged $27 per beaver or $18 per pound. Around 10% better than if I had sold in March.

Wants to know if the buyer wants the rest of the string. If you look at the catalogue the grades encompass multiple lots withing the string. A lot of times the buyer who wins the first lot will buy the remaining lots at the same price.

All of my stuff sold from what I seen , Happy with the prices, I wish my otter sold for a big higher but it was graded at a PL pale im guessing the darker otter are worth more?

Depends on the day...

Looked like a lot of no sales on marten and those that did sell mostly were less than March. Hopefully that means they're saving their money for tomorrow to buy cats with.

Here! Here!!

Awful quiet during top quality Coyotes. Almost can hear the crickets.

Auctioneer is struggling as are the coyotes. Pretty satisfied with sale so far. Be watching mink tomorrow very closely

How is it that a wolf and a coyote are closely related yet wolves sell for hundreds of dollars and can’t give away their cousin the Coyotes?

How do I see when marten are coming up?

Marten already sold. They call them "Sable".

Too many people think wolves are some kinda mythical animal. That and so many try to go after them but give up when their sets are empty after a few weeks.
I must say, once you kinda get the hang of it and start thinking like them, trapping other animals doesn't hold a candle to them.

Yes indeed.

Scarcity.

I totally agree Jake. I had a great time trapping them here in Minnesota. Of course it has been closed for years now thanks to politicians.

But trapping them has nothing to do with what they sell for. The trinket trade is holding them up. That is all they have going.

I see a lot of encouragement for the rats moving but a $3.65 average after commission doesn’t really seem too encouraging… well under a gallon of gas

Trinket trade? You mean like wall hangers and full mounts, gauntlets and ruffs? They certainly ain’t going for tail keychains……lol.
Trapping them is how 99.9% of them got there, it’s how they’re harvested. If it wasn’t for trappers, the price would explode as there’d be almost nothing at the sale.

Wolves have size. And they come in so many different colors. And part of it is that it is a wolf! Exotic species to a lot of city folks.

International clients love em too. If a hunter doesn’t tag out or a generous tipper, give them a wolf, any kinda wolf. As long as the outfitter looks after the permits for them right?…….lol

When rats sell for less than a gal of gas not good. Agree with 160and up.

Yes, there was talk of rats being of more interest, but the average was only about .25 higher than their last sale. To me it would depend a lot also on clearances as well. With mink shooting up by 100-200% one would have thought rats would have jumped too. Maybe next year.

Bryce

I averaged 4.87 on 200 rats. They sold every rat too I think. I’d hoped for a little more of a hike up but with a meat market, I’ll live with it.

How did your blacks do Mud?

Some wolves also have some beautiful long silky fur,especially some of the arctic types,no other fur like it.

Our southeast Manitoba wolves aren’t the most desired, and the further east & south it just gets worse……. even though mine are usually graded arctic. I talked to Winnipeg Fur Dressers to see if they were interested in any of mine. First thing he asked was where they were from. When I told him, he said to send mine to auction, his all come from northern regions.
I seen a few from Waboden area in central Mb, and they’re getting much better, but most weren’t like the true northern ones yet.

Coons?

Eastern coon under 5 bucks. Muskrats are a lot easier to put up anyway.

Glad I composted them.

47.62 average on my mink. Real nice bunch but I didn’t expect 50 dollars females.

Holy wahhh one of my mink sold for 49.00 !!!!

Same as where it’s been BP. 7.00. Was hoping for a bit better.
I had more than half of the entire offering. Helps the average.

Saw yesterday 89% sable sold,I sent one being the prices were crazy in March.They valued it at $240 and sold it for $195 still a very good price,but surprised they sold for $45 less $20 I could see,I'm still happy with that I haven't sent anything to FH's for at least 18 years.Hope you guys with bobcats do very well today...

Looks like cats have softened up a bit

I'm surprised sometimes at how little time is allowed for bidding on a lot. I counted seconds from when the minimum acceptable bid was announced until they no-sale and moved on to the next lot. It is from 2-3 seconds. I can understand that with coon or coyotes that have no interest these days, but cats have been a hot commodity. I would think they would get 5 seconds at least?

Auctions are funny sometimes. Just saw two lots of Central Medium size I-II A-B valued at $150 get bid up to $520. Some of the last cats for the day.

Lot 70115 sold for (I think) 2000. I would have liked to have a truck load of those in the auction. I'd make enough to give up my male stripper gig!

Bizarre stuff happens. Before I shipped a 2 year old stale leftover beaver to Fha in April, I asked how it would likely grade on here. I had 3 rejects from the local sale and the stale one at the Auction. I think the stale one got the western section worse grade It was first lot in Western and brought $64. The 3 fresh ones got eastern section and graded slt to slt damaged where I expected them to grade. The 2 semi slts brought $60. The slt dmg sold where I expected at $41. I almost threw that stale( beaver away.

Wish I could get back the mink I sold in June of 25. Hopefully next year I’m saying it again about these rats.

Seems like people here write a lot about mink. I’ve heard locals say “I’m going to pound mink 26-27. If this happens and demand doesn’t increase to the same degree as production will the price of mink fall?

Playing catchup with the fur market is a loser.
You gotta have the fur before the price foes up.
Good fur managers manage lines based on furbearer populations not on the price of the pelts so no matter which pelts spike they will have some on the sales.
How and when and where to market your cache is where you can really make money.

That’s known as the common “trappers lag”. Capacitors (leg work and paying attention) can be utilized to help correct this quality issue……lol

I’m not convinced we have many good mink trappers left. Guys who run the miles it takes to put up numbers. We also at least in some regions have historically low water levels. And mink populations issues in some areas. I know talking to some good Minnesota mink guys across the whole state mink numbers have been much lower the past few years. The average trapper will probably catch a few more with the price increases. But the overall catch of I’d have to guess won’t be that much higher at least enough to tank the market. Dealers have cleaned out their inventory with this price increase as well.If prices go down it would probably be because they aren’t using them as much.If we were talking a better coon market it would be a completely different story. My two cents anyway.

I wonder how long it takes for China to ramp up ranch mink numbers to quell any wild mink uptick? From what I read nobody knows how many ranch mink are produced there as China doesn't provide those stats.

China wants to quell the major uptick in ranch mink prices first. I thought China raised around 4 million ranch mink.

Who knows what mink numbers did in China during that extended ranch mink glut. My understanding is that there were/are a lot of mom-pop ranch mink producers there. How long would they keep their breeders at high numbers when the cost of production was higher than pay outs?

fully agree

Yup, wolves are the one animal I don't put up as fur. They all get tanned and sold or sold green direct to a taxidermist. They are worth more as wall hangers or taxidermy than fur market, and are easy to move. Even summer hides and ones with an open back (shoulder mites) sell well to Easterners. Only those with bad mange are worthless, and even them I cut the feet off and sell them and the skull.

A few years ago I had two brothers as spring bear hunters, I got two wolves back from the tannery and went to hang them in the shop with prices on them, although caught the same day, one was a nice hide, while the other was badly rubbed (spring wolves) the one brother grabbed the good one before I even hung it up. The other brother didn't say anything, but looked at the prices I had on them (1/2 the price for the rubbed one) and went in to town that day and checked prices Moscow Hide & Fur, and called me from their parking lot and said he would take the rubbed one, figured he could live mount it with the rubs not showing to obviously where he was going to put the mount. I was always curious how it turned out, but while he said he would send me a picture, I've never got one.

There is talk of only 7 to 8 million mink to be offered next year. Which is even smaller than this year. The Chinese pelted way down like every other country.

So next year they start using muskrats big time? LOL

Sure wish I had these mink to sell in the current market. Had 52 and 65 mink, each bunch was from accumulating in the freezer for a couple years waiting for prices to go up. Ended up selling for very low average. The bundles of rats were seasonal catchs. These were from several years ago.

Walt, just wanted to say impressive catch and very nice fur handling. It is obvious that you take pride in what you do.

I trapped a lot of mink back in the day and averages on at least 2 seasons were a lot better then they are now. I was averaging around the $60.00 range. Gas was under $2.00 a gallon and I was driving a chevy cavalier on the road line. And working a full-time job and taking off one day a week and checking on Saturday and Wed. Caught some coon and rats along those road lines. Never set less then 6 traps at each ROW location. I you may not believe this, but theft was just about nonexistent.
But I can also remember when fur was worth just about zero and old johnny sneakum was tossing out the fur and just taking the traps. The good old days. If I was 40, I would become a good mink trapper again.

That's the way to do it. The auction can't come close to what you guys make on wolves there, especially when you tack on the F4WM reimbursement. I asked Paul A why the auction didn't get any wolves from the lower 49, then he told me what he all got, and tanning only cost him $60 a wolf. I could do the same here, but I'd be sitting on the fur for a long time. They're a lot easier to find here, but a professional tan is about $200ish.
Even the junk fur late caught ones get used. Head mounts, gauntlets, fur ruffs, claws, skulls, tails, digestive tract, even the other bones are wanted by the gothic types...lol.

Nothin like a wolf bone thru your nasal septum.
The tatoo / body piercing artists will buy up the bones as fast as you can cleanem.

For all our sakes I hope coon, rats, coyotes go up more. Good cold winters with fur being in style can make miracles happen.

Warm winter predicted for China with a strong El Nino building up in the Pacific.

The only tricky thing is in Manitoba, you need a licence or permit for everything. My animal, my bones, but the person buying them technically requires a possession permit or an animal parts dealers licence……and the authorities lay this on the seller to make sure the buyer has the right stuff.
I just tell them roughly the location of a pile of bones if they want to go get some for free……..but nobody wants to get off their feet, walk out there and get em……lol