Earth Anchors & Drivers- What do you use?

What earth anchor & driver works in your area? Super Stakes? Berkshires? Wolf Fangs? Pogos? Duckbills? Others?
Why?

I use both chained wolf fangs and super stakes. Both I use a 24” heat treated driver. A lot of the ground i trap is to hard for the other brands out there. Reason for 24” long driver is simple I won’t be driving my anchors further then 15 inches into the ground and they fit in my bag nicely. As the wolf fangs become bent or miss shaped from pulling back out I’ll slowly replace to just the super stake ends.

I have gone to super stakes after trying many others. They last. I have 6 mild steel drivers, that I rotate from bag to grinder to keep all things working well.

I see where your forum name comes from.
Pogos here, but drill a 1/2 in pilot hole first. My days of hammering in earth anchors are over.

They all will work here if I make a pilot hole first.

Got "one" of these and skip the grinding. These are made by "The Hammer". He can be found on here.

pogos work great for me in northern illinois. never had a problem driving them in an they are cheap. i use a 16in cable attached to a 1.5in washer. for water pocket sets with soft bottom i use a 2in washer and aint had a coon or otter pull one outta the mud bottom yet.

wcs wolf fangs, chained and cable with a self made ss driver. Mostly sandy soil here.

1.5"x 15" pogos in sand or clay (I don't have rocks) for over 20 years makes no difference, clip & go! 7/8" pilot hole in frozen ground. Making up a 100 or so every spring gives me something to do out in the garage as the weather is warming up.

Super Stakes with chain for me. We have such a variety of soils to deal with around here that Super Stakes is about the only safe bet. I'm sure I could use others but don't care to haul around extra stakes and drivers so just use the one. I always pound in my driver first to make a pilot hole. Makes driving in my stakes easier as well as avoiding some of our sex stones.

Wolf fangs with 3/32 cable never let me down yet

Wolf fang on a 3/32 7x7 cable. 12 inches long. Rocky soil here. Works for me. Cheap and easy to make.

Berkshire H.D. with 7x7 1/8" cable 4"-6" chain at top. For predator trap's.
Same anchor on 3' of 7x7 3/32 cable for water trapping.

Pogos with a homemade hardened driver.

Marathon, 'hammer' (member on this site) makes great stuff.

I ordered a Wolf Fang driver from hammer, and it arrived this week.
Hokey Smokes!... 3/4" Hexagon Heat Treated Steel w/T handle. Handle drilled then pressed onto driver, then nut is pressed onto driver then everything welded.
Hey hammer, great stuff. Well done.






Here's other drivers hammer makes-

All chained super stakes here with 18" of chain. Our soil varies from plowed farm fields where I can bury 18" no problem, to rocky and shale ground where i fight to get 12". And use a ss driver a fellow trapper who owns a welding shop made for me, and have a heat treated as a backup. Used some wolf fangs in the past, but got tired of them bending when driving them in

Thanks Hern!

HD Berkshires here. Never had any problems and they are cheap. Predrill a hole lot of times and have reused many3-4 times

I only use them for water sets but for the price they can not be beat. 1/2" conduit and the driver. You can't pound them in hard ground but they work great in our creek banks.

Make my own out of 1/2" pipe 3" long (although, I may go to 2, or 2 1/2"). Cable, cable/chain, whatever I got. I've used nuts welded to the pipe, but my favorite is a curly q that I make out of #9 wire.

My driver is a piece of 1/2" pipe with a nut welded on top, and a piece of #4 rebar, pointed, sticking out the bottom. If I had to make a change on my driver, I would definitely run the rebar the whole length of the pipe, because I've had to straighten it a couple times. I also welded a handle to it to help twist it outta the ground...I'll post a pic when I can get to my shop.

Btw we have HARD clay most everywhere, and a rock or 2, but not boulders by any means!

Depends on soil conditions as stated by all here. Wolf fangs and 3/32 cable 18-24" holds coyotes in the silt/loam and stoney ground here. Make sure the anchor is secure by pulling very hard on it in multiple directions!!!!

I make mine similar, and use them everywhere. What happens if you pound yours into harder ground?

If you can get them in the ground, they are going to hold. They get bent and stick on the driver and such if you have to hammer on them. I prefer them where I can push them in without hammering much.

I use pogos, and about 16” chain.

I looked at your videos on Youtube. Very good. Could you private mail a contact email, a website or someway to get in touch for checking on those drags and other items?
Thanks.
Mac

Mac, you PM's are FULL!
pm me.
Hern

Your pms are full.

I make anchors nearly identical to these. This is my first year trapping and I am running in some fairly sandy ground (not sure if that matters). I pulled a few sets to relocate today and when trying to reset them I could not get them to turn and "lock in" instead they just pull straight out the same way they went in. My driver is a peice of rebar with another smaller piece welded parallel on it about 1.5 inches from the bottom could the driver be punching to big of a hole making it to easy for the anchor to just back out. Any and all advice is greatly appreciated I am teaching myself how to do this

Makes sure that where your cable attaches to the anchor is forward of center.

It is slightly forward of center very possible not far enough. My first batch of anchors I used a small eye bolt to attach the cable and the ones that didn't break when being driven (allot of trial and error to get my driver where it is now) hold very well. I just got a bunch of Ferrules an a swager and am using those to fasten with now that shouldn't cause my problem I wouldn't think though.

Ive been a double stake rebar guy for about as long as I can remember. This last couple seasons got a little tired of lugging all that weight way back into sections I have to walk into. I only carry one driver and my digger hammer. I have a cold rolled heavy duty bullet stake driver, and I ground the end to a point so that it will also drive berks well. The driver can be used to make a pilot hole first too if necessary.

So, the #2s and #3s coyote traps all have bullet stakes on 18" of cable.



And I went couple steps further with my weight lugging savings.
All of my 1.5 coon/mink/rat traps for water sets get standard berks on 20" cable.



And all of my DPs get heavy berks on about 18" cable.

I’ve used them all over the years trapping in over a dozen states. It really all comes down to the soil conditions where a person will be trapping. Here, I can use chained super stakes with #3 chain and still not retrieve them without breaking them. I get about 50% of them back.

I use MB Super Stakes on #3 chain, and one of Southern Snare's "Performance" heat-treated drivers. We have extremely hard ground and they hold up great!

Use primarily Wolf Fangs with 10" of 1/8" stainless cable topped with 8" of #3 chain for coyotes and general trapping.

Super Stakes and 18" of #5 chain for wolves if there is a season.

And occasionally double 1/2 x 24" or single 3/8 x 30" T stakes depending on application and target animal or when I didn't bring enough of the above along.

Remember what side the cable is on and pull at an angle in that direction, maybe.

Used standard Berkshires for decades. Make them up with 20 inches of 1/8 inch cable and double aluminum ferules. Depending on the soil I sometimes do a pilot hole with my home made driver.
I watch for old wooden cable spools that the phone and power companies discard. I take the long steel bolts out of the spools and make my drivers out of them.
I also watch for people getting new garage doors installed. Lots of the old doors have 1/8 steel cable being discarded. Usually there is a good coil of cable being discarded from each side of the door. Makes a lot of cheap anchors.
I have held plenty of critters with standard Berkshires including some mighty big "Puddy Tats".
I made up some Wolf Fangs and bought a driver. I have only used a few of them as they are to difficult to drive. I have had both shoulder joints replaced.
I also leave them in the ground and use them for many years. I always check them each year to make sure the cable is still strong.

ttt

I have a (stainless) custom made driver, extra length, extra wide T handle made for a Wolf Fang / Desert Spear type head.
I can , using a long handled 8 lb sledge hammer, drive an 18 inch cable stake to the proper depth, remove it and never kneel down

I have a (stainless) custom made driver, extra length, extra wide T handle made for a Wolf Fang / Desert Spear type head.
I can , using a long handled 8 lb sledge hammer, drive an 18 inch cable stake to the proper depth, remove it and never kneel down