Did a bit of trapping when I was a youngster in North America. When I was a kid in the 1970's bobcat was the only spotted cat fur that was still legal in the US so good hides were worth around $120-200. A good coyote or fox was worth about half that or less for comparison, and racoons skunks etc went for $8-15. Wasn't to long after that the nature nazis killed the fur industry and trapping all but disappeared. Most critters are quite a bit harder to trap than the dopey Australian possum. Standard operating procedure was to boil traps in a pot full of smelly woodsy materials and paraffin wax. When the traps were fished out with a wire they got a coating of wax and were then hung up on a tree somewhere. You tried never to touch them with a bare hand and only carried them in a trap bag that was also boiled and left in the tree to avoid getting any scent on them. Traps had to be set in the ground and covered in a perfectly natural looking way which was quite a trick and took a good deal of time. while doing so you had to kneel on a piece of canvas, again in an effort to leave as little sent as possible. The trap was generally baited with something smelly, usually some meaty substance that liquified after being kept in a jar far too long. Kind of depended on what you were after. Only took a drip or two near the trap to get critters to sniff around a bit. If you were after coyotes there was nothing better than coyote urine. My father kept one as a 'pet' for a while just to collect the urine. With some urine in a dish soap bottle you could squirt it on a post or a tree and any coyote that came by would feel compelled to leave his mark there too. Other things that were done differently were that often two traps were set. This doubled the chance of something getting caught, and with two feet caught it wasn't ever going to get away. Also trap drags were commonly used rather than stakes. They were like a little anchor on a length of chain. When an animal was caught it would run for cover and the drag would tangle up and hold it there. The idea being that the varmit was less likely to really fight the trap or chew its leg if it was under a bush somewhere. It was not to hard to follow the drag trail, and they did not go far but we usually had a hound along in any case. Also, a trapper had a variety of trap sizes to be used on various sized animals. Bear traps being the largest were illegal, but people still used them if they had a bear killing livestock. Proper etiquette dictated that whenever you set a bear trap you hung 2 large C-clamps in reach of it because if someone stepped in it they would not be able to weight both springs and they would be stuck there. With clamps you could screw the springs down and let yourself out.
Anyway, that is enough blabbing on; I did a bit of trapping around the house this last winter and got a couple of kilos of possum fur. Not that many around, usually only catch 2-3 a day, but it is still good fun. These last two days of snow got me thinking that the little fellas might be pretty well fured up again and I was thinking I should boil up the traps (old habits die hard) and set a string up through the bush above the house and see whats out there.
Edited by user Wednesday, 29 May 2013 1:02:46 AM(UTC)
| Reason: grammer
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