Week 5…..will this be the last week of the trapping season?   I am hoping we get at least one more week.  My plans include setting Big Spring before the season ends and this is the week to begin putting steel in that area.  This week will be a pretty busy one no matter what the rats dictate.

Today I’ll pull Doris’ pond and the adjacent property and then head over to Club 41 and check those traps.  If there is time, I’ll move into Big Spring and begin setting part of that.  If you recall from past years, there are actually two lines to set out there and I’ll begin where I normally end.  This being a year a bit different than past years I might as well set differently as well.  Big Spring normally takes me parts of four days to set so if I can get in there today it would help big time.

What do I expect in the catching bracket today?

The animals have had two warm nights with little or no wind to bother them and no rain or snow either.  I expect that the 13 traps on Doris’ pond will remain empty.  I noticed Saturday the clarity of the water there is all but “see to the bottom” and so I’m certain I caught every rat that was living there.  The 22 traps in the adjacent property should have four rats, maybe 5, but I just don’t think there were more than 15 rats there in total and I’ve already taken 8 out of there…I’ll have to lean on 4.  Then over to the channel line on Club 41 and the 29 traps there.  My thoughts on the channel line are that the rats will use that as their traveling thoroughfare during the run, but we may have already seen the run (I think we have), so four rats from those traps is a pretty good possibility.  The 16 sets I put out Saturday just might be a big surprise to me, with two nights and the fact that 3 of those traps are colony traps, I could have 11 rats there, which is what I suspect live there in total.  It’s possible to catch all the rats in two nights, but not probable, I’ll go out on a limb and say 11…..And then there are the five floats I set Saturday….two nights of rats cruising the big dam just might kick out 4 rats from the 10 traps laying in wait.  That is as long as I don’t get ducks wanting to climb up on those chunks of wood.

(This is an edit, I forgot about the live traps)  Two warm nights and fresh bait should mean a skunk and a raccoon!

So, 4+4+11+4 = 23 (that’s a pretty big order).

Bears Butt

March 10, 2014

P.M. REPORT

I was fooled again!  Big time!

I managed to catch 4 on the seep near Doris’ place and then went out to Club 41.  The channel line yielded up 5 rats, which was a very pleasant surprise, but the floats only had one rat and two other traps set off with nothing in them.  The big surprise was the 16 traps I set Saturday.  I was counting on the 3 colony traps to catch multiple rats, but only one rat was caught.  The rest of the traps held 2 rats and none were set off without anything in them.  That was the big surprise!  So I ended up with 13 rats.  I’ll update the post as soon as I hear from Bob and Weasel.

Bears Butt