Setting for coyotes in the rain

So far I have been lucky enough not to have to set out a whole K9 line in the rain. Deer season closes next Saturday and I have to properties to set up on Sunday. Does any one have any tips or tricks they want to share on staying productive in the rain?

PMs

keep dry dirt with you.

Dry dirt will be wet as soon as you put it in the wet ground. Is it freezing there?

It isnt freezing, and I do have dry dirt. I may be over thinking it, and it may not even be raining Sunday but it is in the forcast and I would like to be prepaired or have a plan. It may just come down to sucking it up and fighting my way through it. I dont know.

What is your soil like? Up here I have a lot of Sandy soil so rain when not freezing is not a big deal. I fact damp or wet sand actually bed better. I know some areas south have clay, I trap a golf course with clay soil and in rain it is not fun.

We have lots of soil types, one of the places Ill be setting up is clay. The one good thing about all of this rain is it will make digging easier. The other place I have not set foot on, so im going to be scouting and setting on the go.

Peat moss has helped me more than anything

Wayne Derrick helped me with my procedure to keep sets working during and after rain events with out having to rebed my traps. It has worked well for me and I intend to keep doing it that way. Maybe a big umbrella with a stake on the bottom.

In Louisiana all it does is rain rain rain during trapping season.. peat moss and a was of grass under the trap pan.. get the trap pretty tight with peat moss. Then a little dry dirt, pack it down.. peat moss and more dry dirt. Pack it down and a light dusting of dry dirt.. blend it in and your good..

Lots of times i have dug a bed, packed the trap edges with mud and covered the whole thing with grass. Did ok that way.

I am in Louisiana and rain is a constant issue here. There is not much you can do on a big rain...2" or more. A lesser rain can be just as bad depending on how hard it falls. But when i get into a wet pattern I switch to almost exclusively flat sets/bone sets.so there is no bait hole to fill up with water and I also try to really pack inside the jaws and put a good bit of short clipped grass over the trap. It helps with the trap bed washing in and showing the outline of the trap. But like I said earlier...on a big rain be prepared to work.

If you start out in very wet conditions carry dry dirt with you.

If you set dry and know a big rain is coming you can cover the set with an asphalt roofing shingle while checking and remove it during next check or after the heavy rain. This will save you a ton of work. You will obviously not have any catches while covered, but the trap covering will be dry. Depending on how heavy the rain event was and where your set is made the trap bed may be saturated but it will dry quickly.

I use brown and grey/black shingles so they are sorta camo and break one shingle into 3 squares.

I really like the way zagger beds his traps in preperation for rain, the pipe dream method, worked well for me this past season in inclimate weather.

X2 on the pipe dream set

Ive used the pipe dream set for a few years now. Never had access to haylege,i use a layer of peat and grass or leaves or duff.

It's hard. All you can do is work.
Flat sets, post sets. Blind sets should make up the majority of your sets anyways. A few dirtholes along the way. Trench sets. And lots and lots of snares! A good loaded snare is killer during any weather conditions.

Lots of good advice, thank you for your help. I have had pretty good success keping traps and sets working during the rain, i just haven't had to set fifty or sixty sets while it is raining.

Ha! Here we are dealing with constant snow/freeze/thaw/snow/freezing rain/rain/snow/freeze/thaw/more snow/more rain/more freezing rain/10" of snow/1" rain/freeze/thaw/snow/ice/freeze/rain/thaw/8" snow/freeze/thaw/rain followed by 15 degrees below zero at night.

I think I'd rather trap in Louisiana.

While I am a LITTLE bit biased.....I think my Pipe Dream set will help you with your issues.

That set saved my season this year......I NEVER set 100% pipes, as I still think a dirt hole set is a better coyote set.....MAINLY due to the visual aspects of the set vs. my Pipe that I GENERALLY don't think of as a visual set (from a distance).

We had 5-7 inches of rain (depending one which farmers' rain gauge you trust!) the FIRST week of NY's land season.

For the first time ever, I actually QUIT trapping and went back to work! I just couldn't get anything new in and every day, my trap count decreased vs. increasing as it HAS to if I'm going to get the coyotes in numbers I desire.....

Weather broke....I went back at it. BIG front coming across whole country...I had two days to prepare, as I knew it would be a major coyote mover.....

I busted my hump and was ready with nearly 90 sets the on the eve of the storm. Temps in the 40's were going down to single digits.....with some lake effect snow, but not a lot. The problem? They mentioned an hour of rain before the snow and temperature drop. An hour? Depending on how heavy, could be OK.....OR it could be a disaster.

Well, that night, it all happened, and I awoke to 5-6 inches of new snow.....it didn't look too bad.

In the ultimate kiss of death, I had a buddy riding with me that day. First couple spots I clearly missed coyotes.....I got down on my knees and panicked....the sets had an INCH of solid ice on them UNDER the five inches of snow!!

Third stop, had a coyote in a bank set. Clearly, he had gotten caught before the ice.

OH, how the coyotes moved that night......I'd say almost EVERY location had tracks and/or misses on the pattern. Even my Jakes wouldn't work in this stuff, and frankly, they COULDN'T because the pans never went DOWN!

Cody kept track and felt I missed 25 coyotes or fox that day...or MORE! No BS! Now, some of them MAY have been the same animals....but even if I caught half of them, it would have been a good day! That ONE coyote in the bank set was the only catch that day! DISASTER!

Doesn't say much for my Pipe Dream Set? Well, NO set would have been operative that day!

After this event, I pretty much went to only setting pipes. The weather patterns this year simply forced my hand.

Later, in real snow, after Christmas, tough weather again. Just pipes (often longer to account for snow) got me through weather that had low percentages of success, but I was trying to get to a certain goal/number so kept pushing.

In January, I went to Illinois to trap with Randy Birdsong (HeadHunters TV) The night before we got there, it rained, and froze, and then dropped 10 inches of snow! Can I PLEASE catch a break???

I went 100% pipes and he did (initially) 100% dirt holes or poke holes. We took 50 coyotes and 9 cats in a short few days and 100% of my coyotes and cats came in pipes......and a certain percentage of his did as well, as he changed methods on Day 3 due to snow, blowing snow, etc. In the end, the pipes caught more than half of the take.....

I share this for a couple of reasons: not every season can be what we hope, and even if you plan everything to the most minute details, Ma Nature may have other plans for you.

The Pipe Dream Set came after years of fighting weather that showed me that traditional methods just didn't fit up here in rain, mud, ice and snow country. While I use the set more and more each year, this year's weather in two different states forced my hand to use it even more.

And the results were better than I had hoped.......

So, with tongue in cheek, I tell you to GO LAY SOME PIPE...........

Mark Zagger

Dang Archeryguy, I would rather trap in Louisiana also if I had all of that to deal with.

Mark, two seasons ago when I started chasing coyotes there where so many decisions on equipment and procedures that had to be worked out. One of the first was how to get a set to take rain. Not only function, but not leave voids and or show the out line of the trap in the pattern. One of the things I tried was steel screen. It failed. Sand would wash through the screen leaving the above mentioned problems, and some times render the trap inoperative. So the screen went into the shed.

Fast forward to this season. One thing that had been a problem for me was that several properties that I trap have no bare dirt, its all sod. I like the efectivness of a dirt hole as much as the next guy, but I also feel like a certain amount of randomness in set type and construction is needed to keep the coyotes on there toes. Then I saw an artical or post by you, on your set and decided to give the screen another go. This time, in these sod areas I used the screen and covered with the trap with grass clippings. I was even able to keep my sets walk through sets by using my sheers to trim the entrance and exit of my set. You gave me another tool! Now I could be random and use t bones, bait sticks, poke holes, little mouse holes with a little dirt drug out over the grass clippings. The variations are endless. Then it occurred to me I hadn't tried the pipe. I have sense tried and liked laying pipe:].

Another advantage of the screen and clipping method is the ability to make the set exactly where it needs to go. Weather it is bare dirt or thick grass and not be restricted to one method.

Mark, I'm sure I've missed this but I'll ask..I've read your articles on the way you bed a trap, if the ground is froze solid how are you pounding in a trap, by this I mean when you chip out your trap bed in frozen ground how are you keeping the trap snug and not allowing it to freeze in?

When I chip a bed out in frozen ground I can't come close getting it the shape or size of the trap...I pretty much just bed the trap the conventional way at this point.....

Thanks

Frozen ground is a game changer! But, the GOOD NEWS? If frozen solid, you probably DON'T need the super-deep bed I dig to keep ground and rain water from touching the trap, and potential, fouling its function.

First, I OFTEN am going back to sets I made in the fall on the same farms, and putting traps back in the old bed I dug earlier in the year.

Still, that is always an option for any of us.....I use my pulaski to CUT four square sides to form my "box"-shaped bed. Then, I get on my knees and chip away at that out line with my digger hammer. It's never perfect like it can be in the fall, but I make it work. If you have gaps between jaws and edge of bed, just fill in with the frozen chunks you have laying around if the voids require filling....

Usually, even if frozen, if I put my butt into the hammer, I can manipulate the soil enough to pinch it up tight, but its never as good as in the soft ground.

Winter and frozen ground change everything. The good news is I think you can get away with some things in the winter that might cause issues in the fall. Coyotes simply respond better and don't seem standoffish as much, or at all, in the winter. Just get as many traps operative as you can.

I've checked traps this past winter and felt at the end of the check that NONE or very few were operative. Mostly due to blowing and snow drifts. Get out of the truck, grunt and cuss, grab broom, and clean it off. Repeat all day. Repeat every day.

I swept so much snow this year I believe I will try out for the US Olympic Curling Team!

MZ

Thanks Mark

We are supposed to get rain almost every day from now until the 16th or so. I'm going to pop in some traps on a few spots and will use exclusively pipe style sets.

Here, when we get this much rain, you can literally set your trap, place it where you want to bed it (without digging a hole) and use the balls of your feet to squish the trap into the ground. Just line the balls of your feet up with the spot where the jaws, levers, and frame all come together. Bounce on it a few times, fill between the jaws with peat, and cover over with ground litter from the area around the set. If you get enough rain that all the holes are filling up, it saves you some time. But again, its all for naught if you aren't setting on sign to begin with!

And don't worry about a remake, the spot will be a mudhole and you'll need to move anyways.

This was a game cahnger for me. I seen Marks demo at Minktoberfest last october. 2 things were "Aha" moments, one was the pulaski, #2 was the grass clippings. I bought a pulaski axe at harbor freight for $20, it keep me putting in new sets when I couldn't break the soil with my digger. Our ground here gets too hard for a hammer, but not too hard for the pulaski. Even got a special holder just for the pulaski!




The grass clippings aka haylage was awesome too. I trap a lot of pasture and man you can really blend in a set in with some grass clippings. So Thanks Mark. I am now the weirdo out in my front yard shoving grass clippings in a burlap sack in the dead of summer as the neighbors drive by!

I've had that same Pulaski longer than I've had my wife Gina!

In "Dynamite Fox Trapping" Tom Krause says: "I'd rather make sets without my pants than without my broom".

Well, that applies to me and my Pulaski!

MZ

I'm telling Gina you like your broom better than her.

She'd believe that!

Ha!

MZ

The Pulaski is one tool I don't have, and I made a chisel for that frozen ground once. It's a time consumer. I think I'll add that to my tool collection.

Hey Les, get one of your cougars to get you one for your birthday!

Good idea !

Well, It looks like I was over thinking it a bit. It rained most of the day and I still was able to get some sets out in good locations. Not as many as I would have liked, but I can add a couple each check until its all covered. There were pipe, bait stick, and some t-bone sets here and there. There were also a couple of poke holes full of bait, and a couple turd sets, but no dirt holes today. With any luck there will be a mud ball or two waiting for me in the morning.

Yep, flat sets are the money maker. Try to put them on high spots, I have an endless supply of bent aluminum arrows (another story) I cut em in six inch length and fold an inch or so over to hold lure. Stick it in ground, grass or whatevers handy. The zagger bedding is the most important thing. Good luck

Snares. Flat sets. Remake with debri walk thru mound sets.. or make one big mound an dthe the trap side.. killer.. snares work no matter what. And you should be able to put at least a dz snares in an HR. Set and go.

Blee, my front yard is an archery range and at every target there is a bundle of busted and split carbon arrows. That is a great way to repurpose my old shafts. I like it!

Tigerland, no snares here. To many domestics.

I've caught more domestic animals and even deer than I can count. Use relaxing washer locks.. I've never hung a domestic animal. You should have a catch pole on hand if setting with snares. For my area, the live market and for domestic animals. I understand you though I too am always very cautious when domestic animals are s possibility... Which unfortunately, is becoming a bigger problem every yr it seems.

No coyotes this morning. One mud cat though.

TigerLand, it would be nice but we aren't allowed to use snares on land.

That sucks. I remember when I lived in Tennessee their regulations sucked too. We only have 1 regulation period in Louisiana . No traps with teeth.

Exactly what screen do you use? Can you get this at Lowes or Home Depot?

SaddleMaster, I use the larger of the two sizes that John Graham sells. It works well with the K9 Extreme trap. NoBs is also selling some that is cut specifically for that trap, but I haven't tried any.

Holy Muddy Cat!

MZ

Nice Job Dave!

P.S. Missouri regs suck too

Gonna try and Zagger a few before the season ends...

Looks like you did it right! I like the tufts a LITTLE bigger than that, but not so much so that I'd go off location for it....


If you catch possums or coons or skunks, please don't let us know!!! LOL

MZ

Mark, Do you find that your pans get exposed more in general covered in grass vs dirt? During the course of a year I think we all get some traps uncovered by animals (not necessarily coyotes) covered in dirt. Just curios as to how you think the grass compares in number of exposed traps. I guess my line of thinking is why not cover like that on every set and not just on pipes? An obvious exception being if you are setting in a solid dirt or sandy spot where the grass would really look out of place.

Supposed to be Near 70 degrees tomorrow, Coons and possums will be everywhere. I'll keep you updated.

I was pretty proud of this cat. K9 Xtreme trap with wire screen bedded Zagger style and blended in with ground duff. That set took almost 5 inches of rain over the course of a week and I didn't touch it. This morning he was held almost up to the elbow.

From picture # 3 above....

What in Sam Hill kinda yote is that?!! Looks pure evil lol.
Nice job catchin it!!

If it had more of a domestic face I'd say coydog but it looks more tote.. what an unusual color pattern. Would make an awesome hat for me! Way to go!

That's the way it SHOULD work....."Set it and forget it!"

My buds that run dirt and peat ONLY are often remaking EVERY set after big rains like you mentioned. The Pipe Dream, the way I make it, can take a LOT of weather, especially rain. Leave it alone. Put good stink in the pipe and stay away. Not because of human odor, but rather, just get down the road and make more sets. Don't monkey with it.......

MZ

Well there you have it! Nice!

MZ

The steel screen, due to its "roughness" has a texture, and tends to grab the grass covering. While I like the way a set looks after I make it, I gotta admit, I like it even BETTER after some moisture gets in the grass covering, flattening it out, and making it look like a spot in the field that left a small pile of grass from the last cutting or whatever. Since the trap bed is so small, that flat area with the grass covering is small and acts as its own foot guide.....meaning, its just screams "Step Here!"

IF I made a dirt hole in a hay field, then I'd consider making it the same way............but a dirt hole in a dirt field might not look as good with a grass covering.....still, try it and see? You could fill hole with grass and make it look like a nest or something that was dug out.....

In a hay field, if I'm gonna make the set knowing bad weather is coming, I'd just as soon pound in a pipe vs. digging a hole knowing it will fill with water or snow or both!

MZ

That is a prime example of our champion-class, dreadlock-haired, bald-bellied southern coyote. This was a large male caught on yote pee and yote gland. He was looking for love, I assume.

And yeah, not happy at all to participate.

Ttt