Night calling gained in popularity exponentially around me. Amish spend a lot of money on expensive night shooting gear. I suppose more fox will be shot; both in and out of traps. I know some that will hunt hard Sunday night into Mondays. They will hire a driver and cover some ground. Last nice boom 2011-2013 was fun, I ran hard and made some loot.

Lot of completion here last year, I expect more this fall.

You may want to mention to them that using night shooting equipment is kind of "worldly" ain't it?

I was just a hobby trapper. I can assure you that I never turned a profit, but I had lots of fun and got some exercise. My dog enjoyed it too. I'd hate to try to support a household with my trapping skills. My hat is off to those of you who can.

And I would sell you everything and be happy if you make a great profit. And I would be glad something was being done with them I trap to keep the predators in check and healthy. Its not been worth my time to learn how to get fast at puting up fur with my work schedule, family and farm demands on my time. Used to skin them all but the freezer full of furs never got sold and thrown out . Eventually I stopped taking the time to skin tham at all. .

Fur put up is part of trapping and some day I hope to get good at it and tanning and sewing as well but I dont know when that will ever be.

Same here.
There was an auction I’d like to have been at this weekend in Sprague, just north of the MN border. A trailer load of gear. Would’ve been nice to toss in a big bud on the whole trailer. Some junk, but lots of belisles in the pic.
I’ll be picking up a bunch of stuff off another oldtimer near St Malo (1/2hr north of the MN border).

I remember some of those 80s and 90s market swings when prices got high and there were multiple stakes and wire drowners under every bridge. But seriously that was a LONG time ago and I cannot recall the last time I saw such an uptick in folks trapping. Back then too you could still bring carcass fur to a buyer and were a lot of hunters vs trappers showing up.
Most trappers around here hung it up decades ago and I couldn’t say if they even kept any equipment to “restart” if they did want to fire back up. Equipment is pricey today if starting back up from scratch.
This past winter was first I had taken off from trapping in many decades and it had nothing to do with prices or market. We were in process of moving homes and I absolutely had no time to go check and process catches.
I’ll start back up when I get the new place set up.
Nothing to do with prices for me. My buyer had a market this past year for certain species but had to caught with certain methods and no bullet damage whatsoever which eliminated the thermals and spotlighters or the pickup army coyote hunters. Trapping was only method he wanted to see and only undamaged and finished pelts. I didn’t know many folks that were willing to put up their own fur if just getting back into it for prices only.
That wouldn’t have brought many back out of the woodwork I’m guessing if they didn’t have some traps annd finished equipment and Other resources available.
Just my two cents.
Jim

spot on Gritguy.. Those still involved might produce a bit more fur, but it will take a 2-3 years to draw in a large "new" crowd. And I hope it happens, we need the new blood in the organizations particularly. The good part of a fur boom would be that increase in trappers and hopefully memberships.

A prosperous China would sure help fur prices for a longer run. I'm not sure that Iran war is going to be very helpful in that regard. I keep hoping Peace prevails. Same for Ukraine. We need a healthy Russia and Ukraine back to buying fur.

No one can look away from a phone long enough now to get outside and do anything. I did run into a beaver trapper a few years ago illegally trapping off the right away, was shocked to see a beaver trapper, hadn't seen one in 30 years, lol. He explained to me you could get 500 dollars a beaver and he had even caught an otter so they were worth even more, it was pouring down rain and he was excited as a 13 year old at six flags! I asked who told him beaver were bringing that and he said he saw it on Mountain Men, hahaha. I told him good luck and haven't seen him 'trapping' since, lol.

All our new 'trappers' i imagine will still trap again this year, dp's around their corn feeders and such, some coyote traps here and there. Everything including bobcats gets tossed in the ditch, they could care less what anything is bringing, just trying to save another deer and turkey.

Usually one of two things for the older fellas. They either physically can't meet the demands of running their trap line the way they used to, or they have found the couch and it's hard for 'em to get off . . .

Lots of “experienced” truth in this thread but as in those 80’s & 90’s there was one common occurrence that IMHO had the trappers out other than the $$ and that was they could sell in-carcass or skinned, skinned-frozen rather than spend time to do the work & time to put-up their fur! How many older people have we (at least) heard, spoken with that trapped during those years and never skinned an animal and will tell you that they never wanted to learn? We all understand the fun and excitement of being out on the trapline BUT-BUT that fun and excitement quickly fades away when in the fur shed for many, many people, always has, always will! If Groeny wasn’t buying fur as he is, there would be a chitload fewer people trapping today IMHO!!

What Seldom says is correct. Similar to deer hunting. The real work starts after the shot.

Once they convince themselves that they love putting up fur, they'll enjoy it......lol

Yep, and its not just Groeny, there are other local buyers doing it. It allows those trappers not skinning to catch more fur, but not really make more money. It is harder on local fur populations. Without those buyers, fur catches are somewhat limited by the time required to put up the fur.

Who is teaching the younger trappers how to put up fur?

Nope, I don’t believe that Shakey! Back in the day and to right now, younger trappers have families, home priorities to do, AND a full time job. They stretch and chisel out time to run a line but that and the other obligations are the priority waaaay over top of working more hours in the fur shed!

That's a fact, Seldom. The other factor is trapping used to supplement the family income without much time spent from all the things listed above.

I guess I missed this latest boom.
Is it a secret?
How many coon to fill the tank?

When I HAD to process all fur daily,
I did not enjoy it MUCH.
Later when I had better facility with freezers,
I enjoyed it A LOT.
The former was cause for the latter.
To sell unprocessed was considered lazy
in my family. If you killed it, you respected it.

Several guys that bought from guys
that did not process,
made a LOT of money left on the table
by those that were too busy.

A friend hired out his processing.
I scratched my head until realizing,
he could afford to,
and liked to trap.

To each their own.

Growing up Dad and I sold in the round every other evening to Dutch
I didn't learn to skin until I got out of the military. But I still sold them grease
I really learned fur put up about 15 years ago, and it's equal in enjoyment to catching fur
I don't really like doing the bare minimum on fur put up, which is what I call fur market put up
The best thing I ever did to improve my put ups was home tan some of my fur. It showed me where I could improve on my fleshing.

I'll admit it, I'm addicted to fur. I love the look of it, the feel of it the planning on how to catch it