Bears Butt uses shoulder length rubber gloves to trap muskrats.  They keep me dry and they act as a guard against the cold, especially while driving my toy from trapset to trapset.  But as you can see, this pair has a piece of tape between the thumb and index finger.  The tape is covering a hole the size of a dime that is caused by the glove getting caught between the trap jaws and the springs while setting the traps.  I wish someone in the glove making world would make a glove that could handle that situation…GLOVE MAKING COMPANIES TAKE HEED!!!!  WATER TRAPPERS NEED REINFORCED GLOVES!!!!!

Another wet day is in store for the trappers, with increasing chances of rain as the day progresses.  My stuff appears to be all dried out from yesterday and it will be nice once I’m in the field to have dry clothes on.

Goals for the day include pulling the traps from Pete’s pond.  I don’t expect to catch any rats there today.

Then on to Bull Run where the seven live traps await my return!  I’m really hoping to see 7 raccoons caught and waiting for their last day on earth!  Watch…I’ll catch skunks!  That’s my luck.  As for rats in this area, my expectancy is 8 today and like yesterday, I hope 3 of them are “whole”.

If everything goes as planned, I should be able to set a few more traps, 5 is acceptable as I have to come home early to go with Weasel to see about his trapping area and maybe even give him a hint or two about how to catch the cagey little rats.  There have to be a few on his line, but after two days of a zero catch, he needs just a little bit of instruction on trap placement.  Heck, we might find there aren’t any rats in the area he is trapping!  It won’t take long to find that out.

Additionally, there are a couple of other distractions from trapping taking place late this afternoon and into the evening.  It’s part of life to have distractions and I can only think of a couple more throughout the rest of the trapping season, but then, distractions pop up every now and again.

So, let’s see if my prediction of 8 rats happens…oh and as for raccoons….I’m saying two!

Bears Butt

February 13, 2014