Trapping around Trapping

I haven't really fur trapped in a couple years because I was still working on my degree and staying pretty busy with nuisance critters. I have a couple farms I trap every year but it is only a small amount of traps and mostly just for rats.

Well this year I drew both an otter and a fisher tag and that has me excited to fur trap hard this winter.

I know a lot of you guys fur trap and do nuisance work and my question is how do you manage both?

I guess my plan is do land sets that are on route to nuisance jobs and then check a water route at the end of the day since everything will be on drowners. I figure since I spend an average of 3 to 10 days on location for nuisance work that would be enough time to make the land sets worth while and I would be setting a new area basically weekly.

How do you guys do it?

The fisher tag I will try to fill over a couple weekends when I head up north so the kids can visit with great grandma. Luckily we have a good amount of fisher in her area.

If I have enough property or will be trapping out of state, I close the doors. Since we're so specialized with our services, I just don't get that many calls during the middle to late trapping season due to the weather unless it is our predator control programs.

If it is early trapping season, I try and incorporate it into my daily rounds acting like each location was a paying customer. I've found it's helpful during this time to set smaller lines but run them over a longer period. For example, I trap a 400 acre area for coons but instead of putting out 4 doz traps and being done in a week, I only run 8 - 12 traps for three weeks. This helps allocate time for me to catch the fur as well as process it and keeps some money coming in to cover expenses from the regular late fall/early winter jobs.

Another thing I do is make quick sets I can access and tend quickly. I don't want to be walking for 5 - 10 minutes to reach my first set then walking another 20 - 60 minutes checking to then walk out and head to the next job site. If I can't get to the trap in less than 2 minutes it doesn't get set. In terms of sets, I don't do any water traps and limit foot holds to days I don't have any calls to make. For coon, I like the little griz as I can have them pre set so all I have to do is wrap a chain or cable around a tree for an anchor, push it into the ground then add my bait/lure. If I don't want to deal with a live animal, I'll forgo the little griz in favor of 155's in wire cubbies (you can see how I do this on Sterling Fur's Raccoon video, my segment is after the credits). Both take about the same time to place provided you've done some prep work ahead of time. This year I'm looking forward to being able to use the collarum on nuisance coyote jobs during fur season as it is much faster to put in then dirt holes.

Can't say for sure that I'm not losing fur to other trappers in the area using these methods, but I'd rather catch 5 coon than 0 coon.

I usually slow down a little when it's cold out, all except for beaver work and I can catch alot of other critters while doing beaver jobs.

Since fur season opens in early November, we are still plenty busy. The slow time is from the week before Christmas until the first of February. Since trapping during that time pays about 20 cents an hour, I work in the shop doing repairs, bait boxes, etc. ( My wife pays me 25 cents an hour, so I'm way ahead of the game )

same here

Just shut down the ADC and crank up the fur trapping . This year fur prices are looking really good . You should average hundred bucks on coons this year and really not that hard to load your truck every day .

It's tuff for me to water trap when running jobs. Hip boots on-Hip boots off-hip boots on-hip boots off. So I take 3 or 4 days stretches don't take jobs and put the boat in. My clients have waited for me in the past. I do run yote traps between jobs.
This year I may do a week on week off seeing I will have full time help. He fur traps also. So we may alternate. That may not work tho.

Good input guys. Pulled all the traps out of storage over the weekend and got the old table set back up for modifications. Now if I could just find some time around bat exclusions to work on those old traps.

Will see how things shape up over the season.

I for one am not worried about the water line mainly because I do so much muskrat and beaver work on golf courses now in between dry jobs it really wouldn't be much different.

Pesky- I am going to have to shut down here and there because no Fisher in my neck of the woods.....gotta head north.


Paul A.- Life is easier if you just leave the hip boots on and just roll them down. I used to take them off at every stop and that got old quick. Now I just roll them down and keep on moving.

It's hard to climb on metal roofs with hip boots

Pesky, I'd like to presell you 150 raccoons from my line for this upcoming season. I'll give them to you for $80 each and allow you to make $20 each on them.

You just haven't lived yet.

I was actually just talking about checking traps. If I have to deal with a customer they obviously come off.

Was wondering if I left myself open on that one.

It's good to see a lot of guys started out fur trapping before moving into the wco line of work. There would be no ADC industry without the fur trappers.

It was the other way around for me. I started with nuisance wildlife and got into fur just to keep trapping when wco work was slow.

I have to admit, wco trapping is a lot easier than fur trapping. Fur trapping sure sharpens up your skills.

I will sell you coat coon for $40! How many you want? 200 or 300

I'm with you. I started doing ADC before I ever set a trap for fur trapping.

I have never done much fur trapping and when I usually find the time to its already December. This will be the first year I have fur trapped in October. It will be interesting not having to deal with frozen ground or snow.

Now Wisconsin has some of the best furred raccoon in the world so how much should I charge Pesky for mine? Do you think that they will invite Pesky to the Canadian auctions with all of his coon hides?