This young cat was quite cranky. Usually when I release a cat they stick around or wait till I back off to leave. This one was charging the gate and bounded off as soon as I got the door up part way.

This summer a muskrat wrecked havoc on my garden and I don't want to be neighbors with it anymore. It ate pretty much EVERYTHING. I live in the midwest with a retention pond behind my backyard that it has moved into, burrows into my yard and everything.

My friend will let me borrow their live trap but does this muskrat have any chance of living if I drop it off at a lake several miles from my home? I want to move it away before it has kits but I am worried a winter transfer is cruel.

In my area these are more rare than bobcats. I set this trap yesterday seeing several coyote tracks and bobcat tracks in the trail. I put in two tiny dirt holes punched in with my stake driver and put Lenon’s bobcat super all call in one and invisible mink in the other. Hopefully have a second tomorrow.

Caught in a cubby set with a beaver carcass for bait.

I let this little female go this morning. Hopefully she goes on to produce lots of spotted offspring for me to catch in the future. Caught on a dirt hole with soul taker bait.

Anyone want to share some tips on easy to collect bait. Trying to set up a bait mound for wolf snare sets and I’m coming up short on bait. Tried road kill and the road maint route but it’s pretty inconsistent. I’ve got 100 wolf snares burning a hole in my pocket and I need some bait to set them.

C

Has anyone here used beaver meat to grind and make sausage with? How about burgers?

I’d love to hear anyone’s experience with it as a grind medium!

I’m buying my son a set up for fox and yotes for Christmas. I’ve only ever trapped coons and used stakes. We have very very rocky soil here, would I be better off using cable stakes or should I get longer heavier rebar stakes than I used in the past.?

Looking to get into trapping, I live in Wyoming and am a very close drive to the mountains as well as having a lot of fox and coons in my back yard. I grew up hunting and fishing but was never exposed to trapping. Now have 2 kids and coach hockey so hunting isn’t really an option anymore. My thoughts with trapping is the wife and kids who love snowshoeing could join it wouldn’t hopefully be such a time commitment in the field like archery elk. I could potentially do it in my back yard and closer to home. Is it worth the time and money to get into it? Would hopefully just be a hobby to get the family though winter and outside moving around. Thoughts?

Hi all, relatively new trapper here, i picked up some new body gripping traps not long ago and haven't had time to dye them. Beaver/muskrat/mink season starts in a few days. Would i be ok just to remove the grease and set them? Are beavers/rat/mink shy to undyed traps? TIA

Had caught and released a coon in a 1.5 long spring the week prior, but was trying to get this skunk out of the yard for a couple weeks. Kept spraying the dogs at night. Just got my trapping license a few months ago, so I figured a skunk would be a good place to start

Never tail chunked and left to render all summer in my shed. Evidently people leave it out in full sun and get a better result. Used in coyote sets.

If you’re trapping beavers and not eating them, you’re missing out.

I'm pretty happy with my first year trapping beaver. I was always curious about it, and this year just stumbled into it when an acquaintance said he had beaver problems in a drainage creek nearby. A couple hundred bucks later, and I ended the season with five beaver averaging over 45# each (a 30#, 45#, 47#, 50#, and 57#). Must be beginners luck because that just seems like a high percentage of of big ones.

The traps were set probably a total of 30 days in that location and one overnight in another (where I caught the big one). Not sure how good that success rate is, but I'm totally satisfied and eager for next season. Now I have about 60# of beaver meat in the freezer and five decent pelts to get tanned.

A few lessons learned for me:

• I need to get better with 330s. I found a few den entrances but never connected. The traps were triggered a few times, but empty (one time just a tuft of fur). I think I needed to use more fencing poles.

• Hagz clips are kinda useless unless you really need to set 330s at a specific height above the bottom. Otherwise, just stick a branch through the spring holes...

• drowning rods with Hagz locks are so much better than cables. I caught two on cables and both didn't drown, but the rods were perfect.

• even though I was trying for front foot catches, all were rear leg. Maybe my pan tension was too high? 4 pounds?

• Making snares is fun!

I set a live trap out a few days ago and checked it last night before I went to bed, woke up to check it again and the whole trap is gone. What could've possibly happened to it?