Mine will have a couple of pigeon trap wires hinged at the top of each funnel opening…

Please explain the advantages a round colony trap has over a square one.

Please explain the advantages a round colony trap has over a square one.

Only thing I can see right off the top is easier to make.

Well maybe. But you still have to make the cones, and you have to make a door so you can remove the rats. and you have to make swinging doors on the ends of the cones.

I would use round colonies before square colonies every time. We can put colonies in culvert so it’s a no-brainer. I’ve probably built about 1000 round colonies. They are very easy to build just takes a little longer than square colonies. The only time I use Square colonies is when there is very low water. If I can put a round colony in the water, that’s the first thing I’ll use and the only thing I’ll use. round colonies need a gate on them. I put a U-shaped wire coat hanger over the opening flips up flips down once some muskrats swim in. I’ve rolled a trap upside down with a live muskrats in it and it took about 30 seconds for him to find the opening and was gone out of the trap. You need a gate on a round colony! most I’ve caught in a round colony was 23 muskrats in an overnight soak. With a round colony I average 8 to 12 muskrats on the first check in a culvert.
Few pics



This picture is underwater. Very easy to get a run cleaned out in one night



Muskrat drip/dry hanger system while checking colonies. Usually the first ones caught are dry and ready to skin in a hour or so of driving around

Best I ever did was 12 rats In a 8X8X24 trap.
We could trap culverts In N D and I found that if the culvert was full, I had better luck using colony traps. It seemed to me when the culvert wasn't full the rats swam on top.
By placing 8" wings on a colony trap I could use a 8X8 trap and cover up to 30 inches. In a round culvert the rats swam right in the center and right on the bottom. So, my square trap with wings covered that area.
The big problem I see regarding the round trap is that the cones take up so much room you have to build the trap so long to get the added room for more rats.

I could see if you had lots of 18" culverts to trap and you made 18" round colony traps; they would be rat killing machines.

Saskbone sent me a few cones for a pattern, and one roll of wire makes 32-33 of them and I have them cut out and stitched together,just have to complete before I can take over the world.

Dang Sask that's getting it done!