MUSKRAT WIRE STRETCHER VS. WOOD STRETCHER

MUSKRAT WIRE STRETCHER VS. WOOD STRETCHER

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YEITVmnwLwA&t=33s

Awesome videos.

Nice.

GROENY ROCKS !!!!

w

Nice that they take time to read our questions and answer them. Guess it was all about the bales

great videos

Call me woodie!

Nice

Great videos and great company!

Man, tale of the times, there. they should have a room or two of bales by now, not a couple of carts. Way to go with clarifying, thought my rats were unsaleable for a day

There you go...groeny is merely concerned with how long it takes you to stretch your rat. OMG, I’ve heard it all!

I heard him say his only concern was stackability or lack thereof when thicker boards were used. I don't think they care how long it takes you to stretch your rat.

Why is the leather on those rats so yellow already...? Mine leave the house looking red, not yellow. That stack looked kind of gross...

Yellow are stale. Held over in a refrigerator setting.

While you are correct, those rats are worth as much as a fresh Rat, unless you have a dishonest buyer.

So the bottom line Is it makes no diffidence.
Drying time for me on wood Is 2 days Is wire any faster?

I would agree. It could be an excuse to discount.

About the same

My opinion is that a rat put up on wood has a better feel and appearance. They are thicker and that alone makes them feel heavier. They have a more uniform and consistent form also. The wood allows me to close small damage spots with pins very easily. In my mind, these are the advantages of wood.

Let’s hear what GFW has to say. How do you view and evaluate yellow (stale) skins?

Not GFW but it probably depends on if they are buying or selling.

Makes person wonder if that bale of yellow leather mrats were leftover ones that GFW bought from NAFA or somebody that had them stored in their home freezer for a couple if years. I don't think those skins were from the 2020 trapping season. The only time I've had skins turn yellow like that was years ago when I didn't sell for some reason and left dried mrat skins out in a warm storage areas for months on end. It truly would be interesting to know how old those skins are...?

Well He called them GOOD rats In the flick. So It's probably not a big deal.

Getting the message out fast is important in this business. Look at how many views these two clips have done in 24 hours.
Has there been any education on how to change old time trappers habits.


As for using wood to pin up some holes to hide it; great XXXX ZZZZ WHAXXXX we nEED for trappers reputation.

Remember its their money put out, so they have to get their product ASP to their clients, not like the auction where they can wait to get your money to them.
Stands to reason for their cost of shipping to send out bales of certain weights/ vs/ volume.

The other thing you have to consider when It comes to groney Is that he does most of the dressing on his dime. And then sells to the manufacture. And what that does Is groney has his prdouct In the hands of the manufacture before the auction house Is even open for business.

If I remember right in the NAFA grading manual you had to have so many holes in a muskrat just to grade slight damage. When making muskrat plates sewing holes is small part of the sewing project. Pinning them shut seems sensible to me. Sewing up a hole for a dollar or two possible gain seems a bit silly.

$2 is the difference between a top lot rat and the burn pile rat today.
TIP-You can close a hole on a wire stretched rat using a straight quilting pin.

Any competent grader will pick out that closed hole in a second, while it looks better it's still there.

The rat's they use to make hat's need to be certain size and weight. I can't remember exactly what size, but they need to weigh 325lbs per thousand.

I went back and watched the video, when Guy is opening the bale he says it came out a little lite for the grade. This is what I was referring to.

2/3x winter heavies. The rats that get sorted out for that premium?

I don't think they need to be Winter Rat's in my experience. It's more about where you catch them.

My best rat's come from the river and their diet mostly crayfish. Although they're scare they're fat Rat's.

Nice nimzy! I'm not sure mine have quite as much fat as they do.
A lot of 4 to 4 1/2 lb. Rats though, 17-18" rat's.

Do I remember you having the same fat Rat's last year?

Ya that’s an old picture but the rats now look the same. Everywhere I trap in January has those butterballs, unless they’re bit. I’ll be skinning Monday I can take a current pic.

Weekend rats

Need a skinner?

No I got one for when things get out of control. Robin does a bunch of the fleshing. All I gotta do is catch them, put em up and take em off. Lol

Are they going on wood or wire?

Good looking rats nimzy! Man are they fat buggers!

Wire.
Yup, winter rats are hard to beat. Around here they gain weight and size all winter. Once the ice raises its go time and they lose it all incredibly fast.

Nice looking rats Nimzy, sure are fat. Good recruitment from last year?

Wood. Period

Have used wood on alot of critters but always used wire on muskrats.Simplily all I ever had.

IMO the area I cover is in upcycle. Several high water years has helped expand colonies. However a spot or two of which I looked forward to trapping were disappointing. One spot where I photographed rats last spring (after season) had none. We did have a very dry stretch last summer which I believe creates vulnerability towards disease.

Nice rats !

Are you trapping in the Great Lakes Basin? Through the hut or are you trapping under ice?

East central Wisconsin. And yes we have a fine, big rat. We trap under ice Wisconsin does not allow us to molest the structure.

We can legally sleeve the push ups.

I thought the advantage of wood was to ensure the skirt came down to maximize the size. I know you can do the same with cloths pins on wire but many people don't. I could see why the buyer would suggest wire as they may be getting a larger rat that was not properly stretched.

You may think you can square off a skirt with clothes pins but It's not happening.
If your fur buyer Is measuring with a wooden scale then he's measuring from the nose to the shortest part of the rat. And If I remember right groney was doing that In one of his flicks. So a perfectly squared off skirt Is going to measure longer.

But of course you can't see what the buyer Is doing when you go to the rat wagon.

Don't know what planet you are living on, Beav,
but here on planet Earth I have no problem with
clothes pinning the edge of the rat skirt straight
& square on the wire form.

All my wire forms are roughed up on the galvanized
wire so the pelts don't slip when clothespins are
put in place. I sometimes use two or more per side.
Also I don't pull down on the stub of rat tail until
after the sides of the skirt are pinned, and then
only enough to provide slight tension.

You need to get out more, Beav.

walleyed

So putting on 2 or 3 cloths pins per side and hooking the hooks is still way faster than pinning on wood? Maybe for you. I know a trapper who does several hundred per year on wood. he keeps them at 65 degrees for two days and does not need a wedge and then in the freezer. I help sort those the other day and they are nice full and heavy rats.

Bryce

How do you "sleeve" a push up? My ax doesn't really care what size of a mrat structure it is, although a push up is harder to keep plugged compared to a "hut". This winter it may not matter much. You guys with the DNR types, man, they must be busy beavers thinking up all the rules you guys have to jump and crawl through. Do you think they are taking orders from quasi-peta huggers to basically harass trappers into doing double somersaults for compliance or do they think these things up mostly on their own...?

I agree with wally,have always squared my rats with clothes pins

They may be square when you place the pins but when the hide starts to shrike as It dries you going to lose some of that squared off area.
I can store 1000s of push pins In a small container Try that with a 1000 clothes pins. LOL

The current discussion wasn't which method was faster.

The discussion was whether or not you could clothespin
the rat's skirts down straight & square to increase length.

Myself and many others contend that;Yes you can.

walleyed

How do you sleeve a push up?

Well you cut a hole through the ice and then with a shoulder length glove you punch a hole Into the push up entering It below the water line. Place the trap In the void and then plug the hole. Don't try and find the entrance It's a waste of time.

I'm just saying we can legally trap In the push up. I didn't say It was very effective.

Post up some pictures then.

Having done rats both ways and trapping in the same area for years when I switched to wood my average size increased.

Same argument for the last 10 years. Lol

I use wire. Have t caught a rat for the last two years. Waters gone and so are big rat numbers. They are making a comeback now with all the push-ups I’ve been seeing

I don’t use clothespins on the side. If you know what a binder clip is I suggest you pick them up for wire. 1/4 clip(office supply company’s will have them) and use them on the sides. Pull down the skirt clip both sides and gently pull down the tail and hook on. The binder clips hold a bigger portion of the skirt and THEY DO NOT MOVE ON THE WIRE. For 10 years straight I was over a 1000 rats a year. Lots of top lot rats all on wire. Way quicker to do a hundred rats a day and no pins. Everybody has their own preference. Just my two cents


Best picture I have of rats drying. If you look closely you can see the binder clips

So we can punch a hole from the bottom of the pushup but not the top? Where was that in the regs?

They don't tell you what you can do In the regs they only tell you what you can't do.

I guess you and I have different interpretations of molesting a muskrat feeding house.

Lets not turn sleeving pushups into an internet issue. When I do it, i work my way around outside of pushup w chisel, find the entrance cause of thin ice, chop hole In ice, not pushup, reach my hand up into inside of pushup, create a mental picture of intereior, and then slip trap in there, only ice is molested. If you cant find the thin ice spot, move on. I need to get back out there...

Do the binder clips leave a pretty deep imprint on the dried leather? I suppose if it doesn't tear the leather, its all good!

As stated one does not need to molest a feeder or pushup when sleeving. There is always one and many times two openings that the rat uses to get up on the platform when entering the feeder. The fact that many times they swim right under the ice typically keeps the ice thinner over the entrance and thus easier to sound and also to chop. I don't have long arms so I don't sleeve any sizable huts as I can not get to the platform. By entering from below and in the water one can also quickly find out if the feeder is active. If you have no fresh clippings or there is ice on the ceiling of the pushup it is abandoned or temporarily not be used. Several rats typically will use one pushup as that action helps keep things open.

Bryce

That was my understanding of how it was done, but definitely not how the Beav described his method.

But it's not worth bickering about, or we'll end up like we did with road right of way.

In my experience Sleeve trapping is far more effective when you minimize disturbance and enter through the plunge hole. Stake off to one side and don’t let the chain cross the run.

That is how I do it. Seem to get fewer plugs too. With several rats using one feeder you want the caught one out of the way and dispatched.

Bryce

Yup thats how I do it, and if you arent chiseling ice by plunge hole, you could be trying to chisel thru a foot of ice. And to get back on subject, wood for me, and Ive sold groeny rats that have been in deep freeze, stretched, that were two years old. He didnt have a problem with em...

Is it because WI has far more people than say SD, and thus, more trappers, that the state agency people don't want you trapping inside huts...? Do they think that your mrat population will be negatively affected and because you all seem to have more permanent marshes and swamps than say us, where much of our wetlands "flux" a lot, so rat pops swing up and down, and "aggressive" trapping techniques may really hammer the numbers to a sustained decline? Or is it some sort of "fair chase' culture where busting open a hut in the winter and even with proper plugging it, that's not considered "sporting" and so they ban it? Or is there just peta-hugger mission creep and the state will "allow" you to mrat trap in the winter but they really don't want to be too successful. Or some sort of combo of the above...? Truly curious watching from the sidelines...

I know of a Wisconsin feller or two who will disagree with this statement!

Wisconsin’s traditionally has a conservative game management style. It is a reflection of our former furbearer biologists attitude. Caution of unknowns and not quite understood. Which is fair. I suppose the hut busting was discounted under fair chase.

Muskrats have been one that we feel compelled to protect, because they are so “ easy” to catch. We tend to think trappers and “aggressive “ methods will damage populations. Where in fact this is to the contrary. Once again the rat population outsmarts the trapper. Humans do negatively impact muskrat populations, just not trappers.

NPC your narrow mindedness is a sign of naivety.

Well 49er If you have 40 huts In the marsh and 3 push ups it's not all that effective.

Well The times I have sleeved push ups there Is about 2" of Ice and using the cordless drill and my 6" auger makes short work out of drilling holes no chopping holes for me.

Gary, are you sure every rat in the marsh isn't using those 3 pushups?

Don't get me wrong, I've never sleeved a house in my life but I also don't think like the conventional hut buster. When the time is right I will start sleeving to a degree.

NPC, you will find that very very few states allow molestation of the house in the winter.

I have collapsed a few push ups. Opps! Every Tom,Dick, and Harry with no conservation concern could cause a lot of wanton waste. Sometimes laws are about Tom, Dick and Harry, not Nimzy.

Wire 99% of the time. I do use a few boards, but only for rats that are too big for the wire

I have sleeved a lot of houses, not all of em have deep runs. and when there is 40 houses and three push ups, I bet there is ten or twenty more pushups hid. Some of the pushups i set look to be two inches high, you would think there would be nothing to em, but quite the roomy interior if being used... somtimes a rat will not go down the plunge hole, and will tear up pushup, nine times outta ten They can be rebuilt. and while searching for those pushups, set those blind sets thru the cattails. Packin up the dogs and setting a spot up today, still no sled. this discussion is more suited for the wi season thread. On the wood stretchers you can get away w a small belly board, easier for furbuyer too handle then

In this marsh all the huts are tucked back I the Tails. So In my way of thinking there Is no need to build a push up. The rat leaves the hut dives down to the cattail root system cuts it's lunch and heads back to the hut.

I guess were just narrow-minded renegades out here, thankful to live where I do. We do have to stop after March 15. I might have to crack some this long weekend if I can find a slough that still had water in it by freeze up time after our fairly intense local drought in 2020. I've always enjoyed winter mrat hut trapping...

NPC I didn't call you narrow minded.

We can do it here in MN, bust houses, and I'm thankful for it.


If anyplace is narrow minded it's MN's short season. I'd love to be able to trap when the ice is starting to degrade

Narrow minded is convincing oneself the only effective way to trap muskrats in winter is down that chimney.
Thousands upon thousands of muskrats have been captured here in Wisconsin without that method. In fact imo on my line I would rarely use it even if it were legal. I’m with 49er. Get our seasons in order. SD has gotten that right too. Well for it’s residents anyway.

I think there is also a difference between regions (states) that are considered more "humid" under climatic zones (have more and steady amounts of precip) and regions that are "sub-humid" and "semi-arid". The latter region has more "flashiness" in their wetlands, with temporary and seasonal ones going from full of water one year to dry the next. Perhaps that's one of the reason SD GFP Commission manages mrats they way they do, boom population one year, with occupied huts everywhere, and then a deep drought for a year or two, and no huts to be visible. My county went from 2012 through 2017 without a visible hut around, at least along my path of passing numerous wetlands that I often drive. There were still muskrats in rivers. streams, larger wetland "lakes" living in banks but no traditional huts. Capture them when you can.

So how thick of board? I have been using some tempered hardboard about ¼”. Hard to pin. I have also been pulling down the tails first. I have also seen a 3/8 dowel down the belly (air flow?) and not seen that mentioned. I have only a few that I have been getting in my 330’s so wondering how soon that I pull them off as I don’t want a bunch of stretchers around. Same for beaver, after this last blanket I either pull some or start cutting more boards.

No truer statement. There and gone by nature.

TTT !
I prefer the wood stretchers myself. 🙂

Thought they liked answering our questions

This is how I've been doing it for quite a few years now..
I enjoy putting up the little critters!

pull that belly down and staple it, MNRATMAN. Never made a difference back in the day, but now it does..

otherwise, great looking rat.

This is how I do it.

Again, great looking rats, but you should try to make a straight skirt line...

Again, great looking rats, but you should try to make a straight skirt line...

Can I text someone some pics so they can post them? PM me. Thanks