Trapping in the 70s

I started trapping 3 years ago and hear a lot about the 70s and early 80s. How was it trapping during that fur boom? What were some of the fur prices you remember?

40 dollar carcass coons here and 70 dollar redfox around 80-81......grays 40 i believe...mink i dont remember but i always sold them for 30-40 to taxi trade...badgers 40

$35 coons in the round, $8.50- $9.00 rats, put up.1980- 1981

Wasn't a critter with fur you couldn't sell
Fur buyers bid over top of each other for your pelts
Possum and nutria we're in demand
Every small town had at least one buyer
Boy, those were the days for me
I cut my teeth on coon and rats back in the seventies. My father was jealous because as a teenager my weekly checks were higher than his and he worked for the UAW.
Couldn't even imagine what the long liners were making

Prices that I received at the peak of the boom (don't remember the year). These prices were my highs, not averages.

Red Fox $70.00

Grey Fox $57.00

Opossum $6.00

Muskrats $8.00

Coon $40.00

1980 Colorado coyotes averaged $125.00 Red fox $80.00 Bobcats $250. New 4x4 Chevy 1/2 ton $4000.

1980 I sold my top Colorado bobcat for 400.

Never saw roadkill laying....

There was also loads trespassing, stolen fur, stolen traps . Every bridge had piles of traps set under it. Wasn't uncommon for fur buyers to hide their fur in other peoples barns and sheds because thieves would break into fur buyers places and steal put up fur. Several fur buyers in this area were robbed at gun point because they keep large amounts of cash.

That would be awesome, 3 years ago I got paid around 170$ for 25 carcass coons. Never caught a red fox or mink yet.

Got that right if you passed a roadkill to turn around and come back....it was gone!

If I could get a 15$ coon let alone a 35$ coon that would be awesome.

That's what I heard from my fur buyer, calves, cats, and anything else sold. My plan this season is to go after the golden trio and see what happens.

Since we started the bounty program, there isn't a roadkilled nest predator that doesn't have its tail cut off already.

I've also heard that quite a bit with all the stolen traps and such.

Keep in mind that a dollar was worth a lot more back then too lol.

Hard to wrap my head around being able to buy a brand new pickup for 32 red fox.

While the prices seemed good it brought out the worst in folks. If you were set anywhere close to a road most were gone by the time you came back around. Places you had trapped for years if not the land owners kid a cousin was trapping it instead.

Illegal sets along with no name tags brought a lot of the more restrictive laws.

Yes fox were 70 to 80 coon 40 and a lot of stolen traps. Got a used 79 gmc Jimmy with fur money in 1981..

Yeah, it was a crazy but fun time. I started trapping on my own, as a kid in 78. Actually in 76 but that's a whole other story lol. I was and still am the only trapper in my entire family. 99% of the old trappers wouldn't share knowledge back then, you either learned on your own or tuff luck. No computers, no cell phones, internet.

I was fortunate to have a neighbor, ole Chuck, that when he was done reading his magazines, he'd give them to me. Watching Jerimiah Johnson and those magazines is what got me started. When I started catching I was getting 30 bucks for coon in the round, 7 bucks for muskrats, 5 bucks for possum and skunks. When I was 15 my Dad and me were leaving his Sisters place from a squirrel hunt and I was driving the pickup and a red fox was running along the berm on a dirt road. Dad says get up and hit that sucker, so I did. I got 100 bucks for that one but averaged about 80 for reds and 60 for greys. When I caught them, I wasn't a fox trapper by no means.

We had a hound and hunted coon with buddies, the coon hunters were a huge pain in the butt. Because of the high prices, it became very competitive and they would mess up your sets if they seen them. Coon hounds were bringing crazy money. I knew a guy about 30 miles South of me that was buying and selling hounds all the time. He would get between 2500 and 10,000 dollars for a good hound.

It was a ball for me as a kid back then, I found Freedom, it came across me one day and I hope to always have it, not looking great at this point though. I was never a huge longliner and mostly sold in the round. When I started it was just me, a kid with coons and rats tied together with twine, to myself as I peddled my bike to the fur Co I sold to. There was one guy that always seemed to be there, yet not work there. He looked like a Indian, always wore a vest, turquoise jewelry, and a dutch haircut and always a cup of coffee in his hand. He was kind and was part of the 1% who would help young green trappers, he helped me with good advice, yet another story there lol.

I was born in 79, so I was too young for some of the best of it. Grew up on the coast of Washington and I remember dad selling some possums one year for a $10 average (incidental catches, if he would have known they were going to be worth that he would have targeted them). By the time I was old enough to trap I was getting $5 muskrat, averaged $30 on beaver and $100 on otter, $20 average on coon (caught with hounds, and me and a buddy hunting them, we were training pups, they were NOT immaculate coon, lol). Those junk coastal bobcats were going for $100 average and I remember seeing $1000+ averages quoted for lynx. I remember when those coastal bobcats dropped to $25-$30. I was just a kid, way too young to drive but I was hunting them with my dad. Had half a dozen other hound hunters who decided they didn't want to put them up for that. They would drop off the cats they caught each weekend and I would skin and put them up for my dad and at least half a dozen other guys and split the money with them. A couple of the guys didn't want any money and just gave them to me. By the time I was old enough to drive I had the money to buy myself a $6000 truck, mainly from putting up cats. I learned from my dad who was an excellent fur handler and I had a deal for several years with a furbuyer who would pay me $35 a nose on my cats when most were getting $25. Wish I would have had some of these nice Western cats back then instead of the junk Coastals.

A thief behind every bush!!

Crazy but good times! Purchased a new 1978 Dodge 4x4 power wagon for $4995 with fur money. If you worked harder and smarter you could out trap all the competition.

Ever time I hear this I think to myself dang, and then try to kick myself in the butt lol. I could have bought a nice truck with fur money but blew it on nonsense. Should have listened to the old man! It was crazy, a lot of theft, Johnny Sneak'um, competition, good ground was hard to find. Walking that legal line lol.

Back then we were all trying to do our best, put food on the table, make money, out do the other guy etc. I was so green when I started. Now, we have the dang anti's to deal with. But, with all said, I'd love to go back and do it again. That was a great period for trappers and it taught me a bunch.

You learned to hide your catches or give them room to hide themselves.

I lost ground to some young guys who put up hay for several farmers for free if they could trap thier ground in the fall. I'm talking bucking square bales.

I was scraping coon for our local buyer and he got a call that another buyer had been robbed. He set a pistol by me and told me to use it if I had to. Heck, I was just a kid....I didn't want to shoot anyone. lol. That was 1979 or 1980

I started trapping about 1981_82.
Had traps/critters stolen.
That hurt bad as I grew up poor and scratched for everything I had.
Shot my first red fox in about 79_80.
Got 76.00$ for it.
Dad took the $ and drank it up.

It had to be about 1980 or so and two young boys, my buddy and myself, were getting $25+ for coons, $45-60 for Reds, and $75 or so for bobcats…all green. We’d release any “she” coons we caught because they wouldn’t bring as much as the males. All this with a homemade broom stick release pole, lol. We’d flip a coin to see who was gonna check the gender, lol. Coyotes were nonexistent for the most part.
When two 12yr olds were pocketing $500 each every other weekend, you knew the fur was worth something.

'81 - '82 I averaged $72 on Reds, $33 for Greys and XL Coons. One auction had an average $10.25 for Rats, a kid walked away with a $1000.00 check!

I remember selling coon's in the carcuss getting $30.00-40.00
Muskrats about $8.00-10.00 Big Sioux River Rats.

Opossum's and Jack Rabbit $2.00 -$3.00

Never got alot of Red fox or Coyote but enough to Trade for Traps and Supplies.

Was good money for a jr. Kid like me
Still remember them fur buyer's, Midwest Fur in Canton S.D.
And M&M fur at Bridgewater S.D.

Caught 104 coons the first night of the season in '79. Averaged $55.00 per coon ($50 for pelt, $5 for meats). Was enough to buy a brand new 4x4 pickup in one night of trapping. Sold finished possems for $19.00. Made over $60,000.00 in '79-'80 season trapping while still working on our mink ranch full time (7 days a week is full time on a mink ranch). Theft of traps and animals was a problem. That's when I learned that more traps and animals are stolen in "the back 40" than right next to the road.

In 79 I caught 92 coyotes and averaged $96.00 took the money and bought a new chevy 4x4 pickup for $6,000
In1980 i caught 350 coyotes and got to sell 290 the other 60 got stolen along with 50 traps

Started trapping 1978 with a brother and two friends whose relatives owned a lot of farm ground. We split the cost of 2 dozen 110 Body Grips and 12 1.5 Victor Coilsprings. After two weeks of pretty dismal results the others were over it and agreed to sell me there share of the traps as I could pay for them. I had an uncle who didnt trap but knew how to show me what I was doing wrong and by late December I had paid off the traps, bought waders and bought a few more traps. Was getting 6-7 dollars for rats, a big buck mink would bring 40 and coons brought 30-40. Made over $500.00 by the end of January when everything froze up solid. Found out in the off season that my school library carried Fur Fish and Game and read every article and practiced making dirtholes for fox all summer. I caught 13 fox my second season with lures ordered from pages of FFG I remember the two best brought $75.00 each and the others were around $50.00. I worked a summer job and could make 600-800 dollars at it which went for school clothes. Trapped all through Middle school and High School and would save my money to pay for movies and going to ball games with friends. Never lost over a dozen traps to theft which was fortunate. What a great time to have grown up. I dont remember my parents buying me school clothes or having to give me money after I was 13 years old.

fur was worth real money then----so--- how many coon does it take to buy a new truck today ? truck at 65,000 and coon at 1.86 $ ??? ---- 34, 946 LOL sad

Awesome!!

I was born in 1972. Dad had me trapping with him at very young age. I remember very well going to the local buyer(we had 2 within 10 miles) you would not imagine the ENORMOUS piles of critters they had! I swear, you would think they were all going to become extinct. If memory serves,$40 was about the most a dozen of any size traps cost. There were traps in every pond, ditch, creek, river - you name it. And you could step outside literally any night during season and hear coonhounds running. If I hadn't experienced it, I wouldn't believe it.

It really is crazy that you used to be able to a truck for that much.

Yes, it did it seems, Luckily I haven't had a trap stolen in 3 years and hopefully don't have to deal with it any time soon.

Luckily I had my dad shuttle me around while I ran my trapline but that won't happen very often now as I'm about to get my upgraded permit. I have had 3 old trappers that have helped me so much and I'm super grateful for them as I would have had a very rocky start getting traps otherwise.

Great story, at the age of 14 I pay for pretty much everything I want but I don't think I would want it any other way. I would have way too much free time and be like the rest of my classmates chasing girls.

This thread could go on forever with all the stories from the boom. I remember my wife coming home from the late shift and mentioning there was a couple of hooligans parked in the driveway shinning lights at the barn. Run them off, then went in and shot 150 dollars of coon.
Set a bridge wall set and return in a couple days only to find the earth shifted and your trap sits 3 inches out!
Coon hunters cradling hammocks stuffed with straw in trees to promote denning.
Spending vehicle ditch time because we chose to avoid pullovers.

I would still take that compared to what we have now.

Give it a year or two, lol.

I love reading these stories, so keep them coming. I hear all about setting by bridge walls but have yet to try it, someday I will though.

I don't have any time for girls, I have to run a trapline. Unless they want to help run it but that would be rare nowadays.

Actually it's much less rare! When I was your age, I was the only girl I knew in the world that trapped. When I found trapperman 18 years ago, I was one of just 4-5 women that trapped. Now there's a group on facebook with hundreds of women trappers. It's becoming more and more popular every year for women to hunt and trap, so don't lose faith, lol.

I had a friend in high school with a 1978 Ford half ton factory high boy with the 300 straight six. He sold it in 97 (the year I graduated) for $6000. My dad was flabbergasted. He said he bought an identical truck brand new in 78 and paid a couple hundred less for it.

With coyote and coon at roughly zero dollars, and gas at 4 bucks, im pretty sure you can make time for both.

Nobody has mentioned 44 cent a gallon gasoline.

This will really put things in perspective. I remember in '76/'77 rats were averaging about $5.50 (this was a couple of years before they really spiked), and gas was 44 cents.
That means you could buy about 12 gallons of gas with one muskrat.

So in order to be equivalent to todays gas price, you would now need to average about $60 per muskrat; kind of depressing.

One dollar gas,..one good coon bought two and a half days running time. Those tough old buggers slept in the backseat. Sustenance consisted of simple meat sandwiches.
On a good rat lake, you chipped out dollars to stake throwers,..dnr caught on to that eventually..
Winter came ,out come the optics and sewing needles.

I paid for my final two years of college in 1981 with the fur check I received from selling my red fox and mink at the MTA auctions.

I had a roll of bank and I still remember going to the registrar's office as a junior and plopping a wad of cash ($11,000) on the counter and saying pay me up for this year AND next. Cash was king. No such thing as a student loan and yearly tuition for grad school was $5500/year.

Ah, the "good old days."

Blessings,
Mark

Bunch of old guys on here.

Where I grew up 80% of the roads were red shale, and one guy would run the roads with the dog in front and hunt coon all night. He took the wife and 4 kids piled in the car and at daylight ran the coon he got to the fur buyer. I was friends with the fur buyer, and he would show up when he was having his morning coffee. The guy never skinned/fleshed a coon.

One of the bigger trappers at that time showed up first thing in the morning after opening day and dumped 120 rats on the floor. Him and his boy had got the bid on some state ground. After they set traps that day...they turned back around and checked through the night. Him telling of sleeping on a muskrat hut for a couple hrs was like fire in my soul

I trapped in the late 70's and it is difficult to put it in perspective with the difference in the value of a dollar then and today. Beaver at $1.00 an inch made the hard work worth it even though the trap thieves and crooks were out in force. Season for beaver then was mid winter here which meant trapping through the ice which made for some long exhausting days. Mink at $35.00 and 'rats at $8.00 helped pay for a lot of toys as I was still living at home as a teenager!

Chris

My senior year I was determined to trap hard opening week of trapping and talked to the principal about it. He wasn't sure and asked that I stop by again Friday after school and he would have an answer for me then. I got all my school work done and that Friday dropped by his office as requested. His answer was no as he said that if he let me take the time off then he would have allow others to do the same. Didn't make science to me but his word was final. Shockingly Monday morning found me going to school smelling like skunk and was asked to leave. Happy to ablige off I went to run my life. Friday the school called and asked I I had planned on ever coming back. Understandably my parents where quite upset with me,, that is until I showed them my fur check for $2500. That was more than what my parents made in a month. Nothing more was said about missing school afterwards.

Money was great, trap theft was horrible around home. New who it was but couldn't prove it. Fur was plentiful, buyers were competing. Couple favorite memories.
Neighbor was an old trapper and would skin his rats for a nickle apiece. He sold me traps and taught me a lot, lucky as most wouldn't share.
My first red fox, it was a furrow set on a picked corn field, dirt hole.
Had a bird problem pecking holes in the back of my rats on one pond.
My front wheel drive Subaru with reclining bucket seats, could fit down or between the ruts left by log skidders.
Took my great morning check to my girlfriends house in the morning and she asked why I am showing her dead animals. Broke up few days later! LMAO
Ended up with a major upgrade and someone who loves the outdoors.

Gas was .80 cents a gallon. Traps, and trappers everywhere! Stolen traps and especially stolen fur constantly!

I asked our principal to take the 1st week of trapping off and he said if you got a note from your teachers, I could take off. I was an A student, so no problem. Took the 1st week off 8th grade through 12th.

I can remember guys taking a sabbatical from good paying jobs and trapping the Horicon Marsh after paying over $10,000 for the rights to do so - everyone was tight lipped about sharing information.

I started to trap in the mid 60's I checked my muskrat traps using a kerosene lantern Muskrats where worth about a dollar Skunks and possums sold for about the same In 1972 I bought my first car It was a Chevy Vega . Gas was .29 cents a gallon .Than in 1974 the oil embargo caused the price to go to about .45 cents a gallon .And at that time the Japanese motorcycles started selling real well in the US In 975 I bought a new 1975 Honda 750 for $2200.00 At about 40 miles to the gallon I was not concerned with gas rationing or that it cost .45 to .50 cents a gallon .Fur prices where slowing improving .As the 1980,s arrived Red Fox @70.00,Coon @40.00, $6.00 Rats and $4.00 possums where normal. Money could be made trapping .Those that could not catch critters .Or would not put in the work became trap//fur thieves . And permission to trap only applied to those that ask More often than not it was a free for all .And sometimes people paid with a bloody nose or a black eye. .As many mentioned there was money to be made trapping during those years .Find some old copies of the Trapper and Predator Caller magazine for the late 70's and early 80' It was like a newspaper in size with about 120 to 135 pages of everything you could find about trapping .I was just a small time hobby trapper that I would set several farms with about 50 to 60 traps .I would trap for about 5 or 6 weeks at that time .I never got a large catch but my catch was enough to get me about $600. to $1000.00 for a season .And than I would use my fur check like a savings account .Over the years I brought several guns .A nice Olympus 35 mm camera and other items I wanted to have. In Oct.1987 the bottom dropped out of the fur market .In the 70 s and 80s fur buyers where everywhere .There was money to be made by buyers also When the market crashed many of the local buyers closed and never reopened later when prices improved some what There where a few years in the 1990s that due to having no place to sell my fur to I trapped very little ,Than in the mid 90,s prices on some items showed some improvement Prices across the board where spotty but some years rats sold for $6 ,mink some years went for 20 to 25 Red Fox in the upper 20 to about 30 .So if I targeted the right critters and planned well I was still able to sell about as much fur as the earlier boom years .I have been trapping for also most 60 years .It is the thing I most like to do and it gives me the most satisfaction when I am successful And while money is certainly a part of why I trap I do not consider the money to be the primary reason .However in 2020 I averaged just over $3.00 each for Red Fox . For some big coons I received about 1.75 each . I was using an extra 50 to 75 dollars a week checking my traps . I can only afford some much fun So for me the best years where in the 1990s and 2000,s .My numbers as far as critters caught where my best years and prices where OK within reason Not matter what though I had the time of my life running a trapline all those years

Keepem coming fellas. Thoroughly enjoy the stories

LOT'S of people became "trappers" when prices got that high. Plenty of competition out there along with theft like has been mentioned. I can remember selling red fox for $65-$80 bucks and my best buck mink went for $54 but $30-$35 was common . Coon were $35-$40 for good ones for a while. Rats $6-$8 bucks was common. Gas prices low, profits high. I worked while going to college skinning rats for a nickel each which in actuality was paid a buck an hour which was the going rate for odd jobs back then. There were a lot of fur buyers everywhere also which made selling furs easy.
I remember walking out the door one night and hearing a scuffle up the tree by my pile of rat carcasses and when I looked up there were 4 coon that I had disturbed in the tree. They quickly were turned into $120.00. The good old days!

I took my first lot to Ezra Vincent in Chippewa Falls, I walked down into his basement with my fur set in on the workbench, closed the door and this beautiful black fur was hanging there. I flipped it up and asked Ezra what it was. He says "house cat" paying six dollars apiece for them, Bring all you catch". Same price as rats and was catching some in coon sets so made a few extra bucks rather than using them for bait.

One of the things I learned from Charlie Dobbins was to keep a note book Record what you caught what type of set ,lure , ,trap was use at each set . An as you had time put you info in an organized manner I started trapping in the 60,s and did not start my notebook until about 1980 .I do have some general info from prior years but started with more detail in the 1980,s I can look back and tell you what I caught ,where etc I also have some notes about supplies I purchased and prices I received for my finished pelts It is just a 3 ring binder with basis notes .Nothing fancy and not real detailed or time consuming to keep track of But now 50 plus years later a gold mine to me as far as remembering my journey as a trapper .Charlie Dobbins often said let the animal show you what it is doing . Keeping a notebook is a big help to becoming a knowledgeable trapper .

Bought a new GMC pickup truck with fur money in 1980

There were 8 fur buyers in the small town 25 south of where I grew up. There was a local bar owner who said he would pay $25 for any coon. I loaded about 30 dinks, roadkills and blues and he bought them. He never came back for seconds!

Sent some silver tipped coon to agent Jim Metsler in West Burlington Ia. to be forwarded to North Bay auction in Canada. This was in late 70's I believe. one brought $90 and another in the $80 range. Could not believe it then and still don't today. What would that be in todays $. $150-$200?

Another thing I just remembered Trapping as a kid and teenager taught me about responsibility .Traps that I put out must be checked each day. Not when I decided i could While in the later years my friends where partying I understood that my alarm was set to go off early in the morning So hunting and trapping was more important than partying with friends .

I wasted a lot of the fur boom by going to college classes! Still, could fill up a 20 gallon gas tank on my dodge for what I averaged on one nutria. Nutria are what I targeted as they were somewhat plentiful. You had a hard time finding any farm with river or slough frontage that didn't already have someone trapping it. For our crummy Willamette valley coons I was averaging $20-$25 which was dang good money.

70's-80's not many coyotes east of I-35. Easterners flocked to the west for high dollar coyotes and cats. Camps all over, for months at a time. Most trappers had the same location and set mentality, so if you saw a good-looking spot chance was everyone else thought the same. Lot of 2 track intersections, saddles etc. with 2-5 guys setting dirt holes in a 100' circle. Just like bridges for coon.

The 70's was an interesting time in trapping.Besides the good fur prices,it was also a time when trappers here were perfecting the new more efficient methods of harvesting fur.

Something no one has mentioned is the quality, or lack thereof, of a lot of the fur handling. There were a lot of the local fur buyers who would buy in the round, but if you wanted to shop them around much you needed to put them up, and a premium was always paid for well put up furs. Of course every Tom, Dick and Harry who managed to come up with a beaver and a couple coon had heard what the old guy two ridges over, who had been putting up his fur for sixty years, got for his best super blanket beaver and his top coon. They then thought the fur buyer who was offering them a quarter of that for their carcass goods was ripping them off. So they would throw them back in the back of their truck and take them home and skin and stretch them in a couple days.

Go to a local fur auction, or even go by the local fur buyer and peruse what he allowed you to. There was A LOT of horribly put up fur, guys who didn't have a clue what they were doing but had heard of the high fur prices, hacked off hides with holes in them, slipped, grease burned, and totally unfleshed, stretched on all sorts of stretchers in a variety of dimensions.

There were also some really, really good fur handlers. And the money to be had made it worth their time to really do their best and if you were lucky enough to be around one of them it was amazing to see what they started with and compare that to what went on the selling block. I've seen them take multiple damaged (what most would consider destroyed) animals and skin them out, piece them together and make one nice hide. . . heck I've done it myself a few times. I learned from a couple of those good fur handlers that polished their skills in the 70's and early 80's boom years. If you have an "unsalvageable" skin off any sort of valuable animal, it went in the freezer, because they might need it for parts sometime.

And you learned how fur buyers were worse than used car salesmen, you learned how to dicker. It became almost a game with some, but a game where you could lose or gain some serious money. There was a local fur buyer who would go through your furs and always pick out one or two and flip them to the side, "If they were all just like this one," he would say and offer you a real high price for those one or two furs and then a much lower price for everything else. He was of course figuring the averages in his head and generally paying a little less than other fur buyers on average, but those "one or two" high dollar furs out of every lot sure bought him a lot of furs, and the trappers would go home and brag about their high dollar cat, coon, or otter and what they got for the rest of them was forgotten or never mentioned. I remember as a kid one year my dad pulling one over on him. He took all his furs in to him and as usual the buyer picked out a couple and offered a real high price for them. Dad sold him those he had offered the high price for and picked up the rest and took them home with him. Then he had grandpa take the same furs by there, and then my mother (who the fur buyer didn't know), and then a couple of friends. All told those same hides were taken to the fur buyer either four or five times, and every time there was one or two that, "if they were all just like this one," and were worth the high dollars. I don't remember if he ended up buying the whole batch eventually or if dad sold the leftovers to another buyer, but I know he bought about five times as many high dollar cats out of that years batch of furs.

Coongrease Solo was what they called him when he was buying fur in Fort Collins Colorado. Walk into that shop and there might be a pile of shot green belly coyotes and a skinner with a can of raid for the fleas. Now John Solo is an antique furniture appraiser on Antique Roadshow.

Bucky Fur Buyer in Pinedale WY - You Ketchum We Stretchum. That was his motto.

Old Liebsohn and Aldana fur barn in Idaho Falls was right across the street from McDonalds. We'd go in there to sell fur once in a while from Jackson. One time he took a rat pelt and smacked it on his table. A few fur beetles fell out. Education for us kids. Wasn't too long and that fur barn was bulldozed and a Burger King went up.

Boco you are right that period of time got a lot of people started in trapping and putting up fur .It did not always go well But for those that wanted to learn the art of trapping and also fur put up it was a whole lot more information available on how to do it .It was also a time of innovation on methods and gear .For several years I used an oversize kitchen spoon to scrape coon hides Life made a turn for the better when I got a good fleshing knife .Many of the improvements on traps such as swivels and other trap modifications made for better catches and better animal friendly traps . It had its bad side with the trap thieves etc But it was a great way to spend time outdoors doing something that was so rewarding beyond the money made

That was me! Sometimes I was a lil blurry of a morning but my passion kept me going.

bearcat2 we had several traveling buyers and while standing in line I saw some of that sorry fur handling. Some would show up with rotten rough skinned fur that was way past any use.

Bodycount I used to sell to Jim Messler back in the day as well as Meshmen in West point. There was another from Missouri that was a big buyer as well. It didn't take long to find out which buyer to sell coon to as well as the one that wanted canine. Beaver you were better off shipping by far and most times you did better if finished and dried. I was young and didn't want to wait as I was always broke and needed the gas money to continue on.

Back then I had no mentors to show me how to put up fur and anyone who was good at it was tight lipped about how to go about it. I learned how to put up rats and eventually coon and fox. Times have changed and what once was held as a secret is now common knowledge.

Yes I am not saying I never was moving slow when the alarm went off but it kept me doing things that where positive instead of getting into things that where not in my best long term good .Growing up on a farm with chores to do even at a very young age never left me with much idle time on my hands And I learned from the very start that if you wanted something you had to work for it .Far to many people today have to much time that ends up gett9ing them making poor choices

Back then trapping was money and enough money too affect how u live. Today is just recreation to a lot of us. Would be difficult to adjust to the change. I've only been at it for less than ten years so I'm use to little money in it. Even $50 coyotes, which I thought was great, doesn't even compare to the late 70s/early 80s. Only reason $50 coyotes could be profitable is because there's so many of them and not any real competition like back then.

AH THE 70’s INTERIOR ALASKA TRAPPING!

It was pre pipeline. Winter Construction work hadn’t been perfected yet so trapping was way of supplementing income. My drivers license indicates how many licenses had been issued so I was 317,000th getting a license so that’s not a lot of people in this large state! Few trappers!

Areas to trap were many all you had to do was pick a spot and start cutting. There were road trappers but a lot of roads were closed.

Winters were a lot colder then now. It was not unusual to have -50f for weeks at a time 2 to 5 times a winter.

The snow machines were basic. In my case I started with a 1969 Olympic. Moved to Elans and owned everything in between. What would take hours to travel 30 miles and run out of gas in front of the cabin now takes 1-1/2 hours and a sip of gas.

Alaska Trappers Association was being formed and trappers were beginning to share means, methods forming bonds that were previously solitary.

Traps, snares were basic. There wasn’t all the new fancy equipment there is today. Trappers were making money on fur not on new ideas for a profit! You could carry a days collection of snares and traps on an Elan and a weld-a-sled. Perfecting hiding the snare, trap is more important than anything becoming successful IMO!

I don’t remember much about fur price except it helped keep our family in extra money. Gas was a lot less. In the 80’s I will never forget getting 600$ for a Lynx, lots of 400 and 500$ ones also!

Last trip for this trapper was 2016 due to health issues. I don’t want to put my inability on someone’s ability!

Thanks for reading.

Wow, that's going to be a hard thing for me this year with the opening day for rats starting on a Tuesday. Wish fur was still worth something, so I could show a 2500$ check.

I enjoy them very much because I've never been able to see high fur prices and I can just imagine the happiness rolling up on a 100$ coyote or fox and knowing you can pay off your gas for a few months.

My fur buyer and mentor also told me to do this for this next season and I plan to do it because everything he has told me has worked out so far.

The State rendezvous/conventions were fantastic!

I was just figuring it out in the late 1970's and early 1980s. The competition was so incredible that you had to be the first with the most and the best. We all think back and remember high prices, but I also remember the spotlighters, the thieves and the people who would make a set on either side of yours on the creek bank to cut you off. The fights and the anger and the hurt feelings were a part of it as well. It was tough to rise above it all. I learned to give coons a place to hide, or down them, on my road lines because if you didn't, some spotlighter would pull up to the bridge and see the eyes. People hiring young guys to go out and put in sets just to get a jump on everyone else. I remember a guy who hired four high-school wrestlers in two boats to set muskrat lodges on a public slough. The first few hours of the season they put out 400 traps. One guy in our town shot another trapper who he thought was trapping too close.

I quit a good job to trap full time and it was well worth it, but the stress was off the charts. Seemed like everyone trapped and so many people ran hounds at night. After the coons denned up I would go into haymows and dig them out, I would also tear apart the walls of abandoned farmhouses to get to the coons. One time I cut a slice out of a hollow den tree to get at the coon and pulled out five of them. Another time I used an extension ladder to get up a cottonwood and barb-wired 8 coon out of that hollow. Those 8 coon paid my rent for two months. I had three kids, and trapping mink and coon raised them, put food on the table and clothes on their back.

I mostly sold coon in the round as a got them, but one year I paid a guy $2.00 each to skin them and put them up. I told him to be ready because I was going to bring him a lot of coon but he still got way behind; I brought him over 100 in the first two days and then about 30 a day for 3-4 more days; he never did catch up, I had to take some of them whole to a buyer before they spoiled. I put heavy load springs on my pickup to carry the weight of all those coon.

I would get up at 1:30 am and be at the first set by 2. I would try to have as much of the vulnerable areas checked before daylight to reduce theft. Then I would check the sets that were back off the road for the rest of the day. When I got home I would load the coon into a trailer and my wife would take them to the furbuyer the next morning. I would be in bed at dark and back up at 1:30. I simply could not do that today at my age! Then as the water froze up after the first week to 10 days of season in northern Iowa, I would move south and trap other areas or hit a river with a johnboat. I trapped all over the state but never did much trapping in other states.

Anyway that's some of my memories good and bad of the years from 1979 to 1987.

Very interesting insight on how you ran and managed your line I have always told people what you need to do is develop a system that works for you and than refine it .The management of my line was a major part of the satisfaction of trapping. Where to make sets how many to set when to pull and go to a new location are all up And when you do it right it is just pure fun

Lot's of good stories here . Good memories . Was just getting started trapping the last few years of the boom . As mentioned - You learned fast how to not leave sign that you'd been there or sure as ever someone would help themselves to your gear and catch

^^^^
How many others would carry a roll of T.P. so when you walked out of the brush no one would want to go see what you were up to.
I've done that several times when trapping marten and cats along popular snowmachine trails..

I like it the way it is now. No competition and plenty of fur!

No matter what I love it but I would like to at least pay off my gas which may or may not happen, who knows?

Target what you can sell for the most $. Cats

I haven't seen or heard of a single cat east river unless they're within 30 miles of the river. I wish I had some cats to trap though.

Here is a receipt for some supplies I got some time in the 1980's .There is no date on it but I am certain that it was in that time period .Lure was $2 to $ 3 dollars an oz . And a dozen Victor 1.5 coil springs cost $32.50 That trap right now is listed for $9.75 each. So a $70 red fox was worth 2 dozen traps than And now it might take 2 or 3 red fox or racoon to get you one trap. My complete list on this order was for $59.00 .Again less than 1 red fox or 2 nice coons during the 70.s/80.s era To be a successful trapper you need to be an optimist .And you have to have it in your mind that right now is the best time to accomplish whatever goals you set .And than go and do it a have fun with it .

I began selling lure in 1984 and my prices were in line with the others at $2.75 per ounce. Today at $7.50, and with the cost of ingredients now, versus then, lures have almost kept up with the cost of inflation (they should cost $7.75) but not with the cost of ingredients. Back in 1984, there were glands to be had EVERYWHERE but today a gland is a rare and wondrous thing.

Had to prospect more back then. Not a big deal to catch 100 coyotes now but it was then. Milligan got 400 one year. An amazing catch for the time. Unfortunately he made a lot of landowners mad. Still some bad blood here in KS for trappers cause of him.

I think today its a waste of time to walk anyplace. Then it was not. By walking I didnt get a lot of stuff stolen. I was trapping a lot of BLM. I just walked from the house. Led a horse sometimes to carry stuff when setting up a new line. Had a german shepard dog I put a pack on when checking. I skinned as I caught instead of carrying dead animals. Limited how many traps I ran but theft was not a big problem. Nobody was getting in my shed without that dog waking me up.

It helped a lot if you knew who your competition was and how they operated. The spot lighters were the worst on stealing fur/traps

There have been many changes to trapping over the last 40 plus years in PA Otter ,fisher, and bobcat are now legal . Only in limited numbers and for a short season however Beaver trapping regulations have been changed to allow a greater chance of taking them Cable releases are also legal during a special season and anyone wanting to use them must take a training class . It was said during the 1980's that PA did not have coyotes ow they exist through state .It could be said in some ways that right now is the good old days For me my most enjoyable trapping years where from about 1994 through about the last 2 years .REALLY LOW fur prices and declining health have limited my time spent trapping

Well me and my buddy trapped lots of rats and coon from 80-83, our sophomore thru senior year. We could be seen at 4:00 Am riding
our ten speeds through town. The cops knew us. Seemed like every little drainage had rats and every feeder creek on our local lake
had piles of them. One day at school a buddy was telling everyone how he took out the trash at midnight at the local pizza hut and a pile
of coon jumped out of the dumpster, of course we were there that evening and caught three on the trails up to it, that was a $90 morning
of coon and we ended up taking 11 from there. We also had several local buyers. He would grade out our rats and we'd just sell him the
xlarges, go right around the corner and that buyer would grade out our rats and we'd have 20 XL with him as well because back then he
compared them to each other, oh the good ole days. When you'd get $3000 for fur that was big money for a 16 year old back then.

PA had a 3-beaver limit at one time, my 5 siblings and I got our limit and received a little under $900 for all those beaver!

Was not trapping then(born in 71) but a friend who's been helping us get started trapped with his brother (still does)and he's told me several times they made at least twice as much trapping in a few months than they did working their full time construction jobs. Were usually laid off by trapping season so could go all day everyday.

Yes PA had very limited beaver trapping in the 60's and 70's You could only have so many sets out and they restricted you on trap sizes and trap location in and around the beaver dams And you needed to get any you caught tagged by the PGC .And that $900 would have gotton you a lot more than 3 baskets of groceries at the local store .

Dont like to reminisce it makes me feel so old, those were my golden years

Well I have been told that life begins at fifty Thay guy was lying ! And you only have two choices You either get old or the other option is to die young .So call me old man all you want .It is a title you only earn one way A s for me i I am proud to have it and I hope to keep it for many years to come

Best prices I remember as top price:

Coon $40.
Rats $8
Weasel $10!
Mink $25 male $15 female
Beaver $45
Otter $180
Possum $4

Those were the days!

After bragging up his cat man do for yrs Ive since learned he wasn't well respected in ks back in the boom days. Wonder if he is the one making his line of lures still

There were a lot of Greenhorns that had zero trapping experience but wanted to participate in the 1970’s Goldrush- thanks to their participation we have to live with a lot of restrictions and regulations that unfolded as a result of non-target catches- dryland body grip changes as one example.

1978 to 1982 was good prices. I sold my first mink for 53.00. Muskrats where 6.00. I was 14yrs old at the time. Fox where 100.00. Raccoons where 50.00. This was MN fur

Good times! Probably why I won't trap for slave labor prices.

Despite there being high prices in the mid-1970s and early 80s here is a valuable lesson I learned from Ron Scott, a fur buyer in Richmond, Indiana at the time.

Shortly before Christmas in 1978, another local trapper and I, traveled across state lines to Richmond to sell our furs at Ron's place.
We had to wait in line, as there were at least a half dozen other trappers there before us.

When it came to my turn, I marched up to the table and laid out my furs, which consisted mostly of red and grey foxes, along with a pile of raccoon and about 30 mink.
I stepped back and watched as Ron went through my furs, moving this one here and that one down there and so on.
After what seemed like an eternity, Ron approached me with a piece of paper that he had written his offer on.
I could have died on the spot !

Ron had graded my furs and written his offer of. . .so many red foxes at $70, so many grey foxes at $50, etc. and it dropped straight down from there.
All the red foxes I had counted on being $70, now were $40, $30 and $20 fox.
The greys went from $50 to $30 to $10.
The raccoon and mink were the only items that held firm.

While I did have some top-dollar skins, it was only a fraction of what I had.
The money I had counted on ended up being less than half.
I was crushed.
I turned to my buddy, feeling devastated, and said, "I think he's trying to cheat me. "
He, being older and wiser said, "You don't have to accept it and you have the right to ask him to explain his offer."

So, I walk up and ask Ron, " Why is your offer so low ?"

He turns toward the table, picks up a red fox, and asked, "When did you trap most of these foxes. . .Early November ?"
He knew the answer.
"Do you see how long the guard hairs up here on the neck are? ", he asked
"These are number one foxes
These are $70 foxes".
"Now look closely at the pile of foxes next to it", he stated

And then he proceeded to go down the line. . .

Most of my foxes were caught early to mid-November, when the season opened on November 10th
Some in early December and the smallest number after December 15th.
So, in other words, the majority of skins I had to offer were early and not worth top dollar.

But, that's what you did back then. What everyone did.
Wait to trap and the guy across the fence, had already trapped your fur.
It was a 'dog eat dog world'.

Up to that point, no one had shown me how to grade fur.

I got a first-hand lesson up close and personal that night.

It cost to get an education



***Decades later I ran into Mr. Scott and thanked him for teaching me how to grade fur.
I from that point on, started after Thanksgiving.

Yes Many flash in the pan trappers got a star at that time .And they where bad for all trappers and the sport of trapping .Beyond the illegal things that they where . doing the down right stupid things that ended up affecting the many good trappers I always said I would rather trap and have competition with 10 good trappers than 1 bad trapper At least most good trappers would not interfere with what you where trying to do . And there where a whole lot of ba dtrappers during that time

For comparison from 1980 prices to now....

A 1980 $40 raccoon is $143.84 in 2022 dollars

$70 fox would be $251.72 in 2022

$8 muskrat would be $28.77

$250 western bobcat would be $899

I think bobcats might be the only thing that have sort of kept up over the years

That is the one thing that the value of a dollar at that time was so much greater than It was not just that furs where selling at unheard of prices It was that you could buy a new truck or a couple new guns and still pay expense for new gear and gas money And at the time wages where still less than $2.00 an hour many places .I started working in 1972 and my starting wage was 2.35 an hour .That is 18.80 a day and my weekly take home was $82 .00 Two foxes or 3 or 4 racoons was equal to a weeks wages No wonder everyone decided to trap But it was not as easy as most thought And it required a level of dedication than most did not have

thats why a lot of young guys think their getting a good deal now they have no clue that fur was a big part of guys income back then heck a lot of them cant even add 2 and 2 any more its sad now days

High fur prices bring out the "Rif-Raf". I know what it is like to have all of my traps stolen in one night! Takes all the fun and profit out of it.

$145 coon seems like more fun and definitely more profit even if u lose some traps and fur.

Yes there was certainly a down side to the prices at that time I was not immune to having fur and traps stolen .And it was very hard to deal with because most often as not it was others that called themselves trappers that where doing it

Never worried must about theft, cost of doing business. Reset and carry on, a $40/coon bought a lot of traps.

I didn't start till 1982.

Pros and cons of that era,that I was lucky enough to be a trapper at the time.Bought my first brand new vehicle with trapping money then. 1981 Chevy Scottsdale Pickup Truck. $6000 cash,,, fur money. Fur prices were fantastic.Good luck seeing any road kill as they were picked up right quickly.One problem was,,a lot of bone heads saw the prices of fur,,and thought it was a get rich quick scheme.So there were lots of idiots roaming the country side at the time.Also,,lots of trap and trapped animal theifs.Some called them "Johnny Sneakums" back then.I had my own choice names for them. Another thing was,,with the high coon prices,,every body and their brother had a coon dog.Lots and lots of traps set in the woods PLUS Lots and lots of dogs running the woods,,,was not a good mix.I think that's when trappers and dog hunters started their little fued that sort of continues today.One good thing was because of all the theifs,, that's when I learned to "blend" or "hide" my sets so only the animal could find them.I still do that today.Also,,all the weekend warriors that bought lots of new traps thinking trapping was an easy get rich quick deal realized they knew nothing about it,,and that it was a lot of work.They tried it for one season,,then I bought a mountain of traps for pennys on the dollar.Lots of Blake & Lambs. Those were some good times for sure.P:S:,,I started trapping on my own in 1969.I now own a Nuisance Control trapping business.

I started in 79 -80 before I could drive. The crash hit in 87. As a teen, it was a good lesson in the supply and demand, and seeing how a world economy works.

The most recent fur boom of 2010 -2013 was short-lived but crazy. My NAFA red fox list went from a high of 122.00 for my best red down to 6.00 for the worst. 47.00 average. Most of us started October 21st that year; knowing that early PA reds were still going to sell. China could not get enough of the reds. It's all over now....

American and Canadian women have a LOT of disposable income. They were buying fur in the 70-80's. Now they are convinced its immoral. Women in Russia and China want our fur. Unfortunately they don't have near the disposable income of N. American women. Even worse the childish fussing of
N. American, Russian, and Chinese politicians, ignoring policies that would benefit all of us, have put the brakes on fur sales.

Back in 1980 I ran hard, it didn't matter where I went or how hard I tried to hide my sets i lost alot of fur and traps. I new who the main person steeling was I talked to the game warden he wouldn't do anything. Found out later years he was running at night with a spotlight. I lost enough fur and traps to pay for a new pickup

I was in France in the late fall of 1978 and nearly every other woman on the street was wearing fur. Much of it nutria by the way. Germany was a huge buyer as well, I know they bought tons of grey fox.

No doubt the animals rights movement had an effect on fur sales to western Europe. After the wall came down we were assured that Russia would become a huge buyer of fur once the population had disposable income. Then China came along to help float the boat. One thing I can say is that prices are always faster to drop than they are to rise. Nature of the beast I suppose.