More Club 41 today…in earnest!

Yesterday I was able to set 22 traps in an area no bigger than a quarter block.  IT looked like a lot of rat activity but I had to remind myself that a few critters can make a lot of tracks when they don’t have much room to move around.  There might be 15 rats in there.

As you know I picked up a new computer this week and I was going to make this posting from it, but it won’t let me go to this site for some reason.  Anyway, until I figure that one out you will just have to put up with postings from this old computer.  Which by the way is going to go to my oldest sister as soon as I am weaned from it!  And as soon as I get one more big file moved to the new guy.

Anyway, that was a side track to the rat trapping activities.

Last night we noticed that all the male rats are swollen and the run is in full swing!  That means we “might” have one more week of trapping and the timeline has caught up with us.  I still have big plans to finish setting Club 41 and want to move over to the Big Spring area as soon as I can, but that might not happen!  I’m moving as quickly as I can, but there seems to always be something that hinders my plan…Maybe I need to relax.

I took a couple of pictures last night of a “before combing” and “after combing” to show just how much better the fur looks.  I hope to include that in a story soon, but those pictures are loaded on my new machine and unavailable to me on this one.

The weather man is calling for a beautiful day today and it’s days like this that make me feel really good about being out doing this trapping stuff.  A whole lot better than seeing it pouring cold rain and knowing I have to put all my plastic stuff on in order to do my trapping duties.

So, what will the day bring?

The 22 traps should kick out 10 rats, Doris’ pond will be a big fat zero and the 29 sets on the channel at the club should yield 6….16 rat day.  No raccoons or skunks.

Bears Butt

March 8, 2014

P.M. REPORT

What a beautiful day it was out West!  Almost the temperature Bears Butt predicted back on February 2nd!  NICE!

By the way, this is being updated on my new computer.

I hit the new area first thing and found eight rats waiting for me!  Not the 10 I expected, but 8 is better than none.  Some of the traps I had set I really expected to see rats in did not have anything…that’s trapping!

Doris’ pond produced zero, as expected and then on to Club 41….the cattle out there are funny…they see a vehicle and suddenly come running expecting food…I had none, so they hung around awhile and then went on to better grass fields…by the way there is no food for them out there and they need some…OWNER…PLEASE FEED YOUR ANIMALS!!!

Checking the 28 traps on the channel, most of the traps were high and dry, as I expected with the high water from yesterday receding and leaving some of them as far away from the water as a foot.  Every one of the traps had to be redone and moved closer to the water…a time consuming chore.  Once I was done checking and packing away the four(4) rats I caught, it was on to bigger and better things….setting more traps.  I made it back to the rig and loaded up the toy…the cattle were laying all around the rig and waiting for food, but I had to move down the line closer to the big dam.

I loaded up and headed in that direction…cattle in tow!  They are crazy!

My first order of business was to set the floats on the dam…5 of them…what a chore and Bob has made sure some of them have traps that are nearly impossible to set and have very short chains….frustration was mounting, but I got it done.  There are two traps per float and so 10 traps are set and ready for the unsuspecting.  Nice smelling carrots with secret sauce on them as well!

And then the fun part of the day…go exploring!

WOW!  The first thing I found was “CHANGE”….they have changed almost everything out there.  Opened ditches that have never been opened as long as I have trapped it, closed ditches that have always been opened.  Where I could consistently catch 10 rats, was void of any rat sign and the den holes 3 feet above the water line…totally changed.  I figured one place that would never be changed was the two seeps up by the house that borders the club….I drove the distance up to there and sure enough….change!  Not change from the club members, but change from lack of rats to keep it looking like it did even up to a year ago.  A small run of water meandering down through a meadow of chewed off bulrushes and no sign of a rat any where!  A place Wapiti and I had a hay day catching rats at last year….nothing!

So, over to the small pond that the club President (Matt) insisted I trap two years ago and the drainage out of it….I started at the bottom of the line and worked my way up…first off the water at the bottom is WAYYYYY deeper than it has ever been and no rat houses or feed dens could be seen…it wasn’t until I was 1/4th of the way to the pond that I found the main water stream and I set a colony trap in it…it was clean and deep…just like rats like to have them.  As I worked my way up stream toward the pond, I found a little sign here and a little sign there, but nothing really great until I hit “the feed area”….a small stand of bulrushes encircling three feed mounds.  I set 11 conibears there to cover EVERY run coming and going from that spot!  Total “over saturation”…but by now my mind said, these 5 rats have got to go!  If no other rat lives on Club 41, these don’t belong here either!  I set 16 sets on this place and figure that by Monday, I will have caught every rat that exists here!  Long live the Rat Trapper!

So, what am I trying to say here?

I’m saying, that 5 or so years ago, I was asked to come and trap this club and help these guys out with a muskrat problem and now, they don’t have one!  I have done my job and wiped out the entire group….well, you can never catch them all, but they do not have any muskrat problems right now….none!  And I’ll make it a part of my report when I sent them my trap/catch report for their annual meeting.  Who has done his job…Is me!

So, I ended up at the skinning shed with 12 rats!  Bob only had 2 and Weasel (On a Roll) caught one!  A 15 rat day!  We’ll take it!  I had one live trap tipped up on its top so the critter that tried to get into it tripped the door and then continued to try and get the rat body out of it, unsuccessfully.

So, what’s next?

No rats on Doris’ pond, I’ve caught all the rats on the property next to Doris’, There are no rats on Club 41, we have trapped all of Petes.  BIG SPRING! Strategy being thought about as I type!

So, ending week 4….A total of 116 rats for the week, but the big deal is Weasel accounted for two of them!  YEA!

Bears Butt (from the new computer)

With a full load of traps, I entered Club 41 about 9:30 a.m. intent on setting them all!  BUT, as anyone who has a big goal and only 24 hours in any given day, it did not take long to exhaust the time I had and soon it was 12:30 and I had to go!  I only got 29 traps set and they are all very marginal sets at that.

Have I done such a good job in the past that I have caught all the rats from this club?  There was little to no sign of rats anywhere I traveled, but with my determination I just had to swag in a trap here and there.  Today will tell the tale if there are any rats there or not.  One thing for certain, there isn’t much water.  I recall when I first went into the club several years ago, the water was deep and the rats were everywhere.  Hiding in the high banks of the lakes in small squished holes.  Those holes are high and dry now and the water is only contained in a small stream that meanders through what once was a large body of water.

Yesterday, I just followed that stream until it got to a place where I could no longer follow on the toy.  The sign I saw was mostly contained in a grove of low growing trees.  And that sign was very minimal.

While I was setting my traps, Bob drove through to his intended spot at the end of the road and down at the South end of the club.  He looked around for sign but saw nothing and decided not to set any traps.  He left me a note in the car when he went out and I’m glad he did as I had not seen him go out and wondered if I should lock the gate when I left or not.

Today I am going to set the small seep SE of Doris’ place that Richard Nicholas got me permission to trap.  And I hope to put a few more traps on Club 41, IF I can find some sign and if I have the time.  Bob thinks I’m wasting my time on there and should be trapping Big Spring.  He went in there and set a dozen traps and says there is sign everywhere.  I don’t doubt that, but I have an obligation to trap Club 41…they are counting on me and I have to give it a good shot.  Every rat caught takes a “hole digger” away from the dikes.

Expected catch today?

29 traps  should yield 11 rats…by the way I could not get Bob to bet with me on the 11 rats…he wanted me to go 14…no way will I catch 50% with so little sign.

I have a hunch I’ll have a raccoon as well…It’s just a feeling.

Bears Butt

March 7, 2014

P.M. REPORT

A rather cold windy day out West today.  I managed to set 22 traps in the field adjacent to Doris’ place and figure I’ll pull those traps on Monday.  There are a few rats there, but not many and three nights should be enough to catch the majority of them.  I didn’t go to the end of the line to see where the water went, but it looked like it narrowed down and ended up in a pond.  At least that is what I thought I was looking at.  My time was taken up a bit when I first arrived at Doris’ as Richard was trying to wire a 3 way plug to his water pump and was having a difficult time and asked if I could help him.  I did what I could and eventually he was ready to make it work.  But it did cost me about 30 minutes of trap setting time.  Oh well, always something getting in the way.

Yesterdays rain caused my line some problems, as the water up stream raised the level where my traps were set and many of my traps were under about 6 inches of water…totally out of service.  The water level is coming back down to where it was when I set the traps, but still too deep in my opinion…by tomorrow morning it should be back to normal.

I did manage to catch 10 rats and had one trap set off with nothing in it…very close call to my 11 expected….

On the way home I stopped to talk with Bob and he made a beer bet with me that he would catch more than me.  He had 5 in the truck at that point and still quite a few traps to check.  I just went out to the shed to see how many he had, but they are in a bag and I don’t want to ruin his surprise…he either has more than 10 rats in the bag, or 10 or less and a beer in the bag.  I’ll let you know later.

Bears Butt

Bob won the beer bet with 11 rats!  That’s 3 beer bets I’ve lost to him this trapping season!

I’m getting a later start than I expected, but I’ll just have to deal with that.  I got my new computer yesterday and as yet have had the time to even attempt to learn how to even turn it on….I tried stroking it lightly and saying “I Love You”, but that didn’t work…maybe tonight?

Anyway today is the day that Bob and I head into Club 41.  Bob will head to the South end, while I go North and we should meet in the middle somewhere.  With the lack of water everywhere else, we might find that the club is out of water too.  Our trapping may be about over for the year.

Richard Nicholas did call me and tell me that I had permission to go into the property South of Doris’ and trap that.  Today I plan on going in and setting a few traps there as well.

So, Club 41 is the main goal for today…I have over 100 traps on my rig that need to find water.  A trap on the rig does not catch rats.

I will check the traps on Peterson’s and Doris’ pond after I get through setting traps and so I expect to arrive back home very late…5ish tonight.

The weather is calling for a chance of rain (60%) and windy…not the best of days to be going out trapping, but still it’s a day, right?

What do I expect for a catch day?  Well, Peterson’s is about dried up as far as rats go.  I did manage to set 12 traps yesterday so I expect those to kick out 6 rats.  Doris’ pond has been a real surprise but I think I have all the rats caught out of there.  So 6 rats.  The live traps were not checked yesterday and I expect a skunk and a raccoon in them.

Bears Butt

March 6, 2014

P.M. REPORT

Club 41 is very disappointing…no rat sign and very little water.  I did follow the incoming channel and set 29 traps “just because”.  Bob came in and went to the end of the road and checked for sign, but decided not to set any traps…no sign…no rats.  I still have to go look around a few small areas to make sure there aren’t any rats that have filtered back in since last year, but I just might end up pulling the 29 traps and getting out of there…we will know more in a couple of days.

I pulled all 62 traps from Peterson’s today, and got quite wet in the process…my “new last year” boots from Frogg Toggs developed a crack in the top of the boot….This really PIssssssssssssssssess me off!

The traps at Peterson’s kicked out 5 rats…that was my catch for the day!

At the skinning shed Bob had tossed 4 rats on the floor…a nine rat day!  Well, nine is better than 8 and a whole lot better than none!

Bears Butt

Going into Peterson’s.

The weather today is supposed to be nice!  Highs in the mid 50’s and mostly sunny….different than yesterday and different then they are saying is coming our way tomorrow.  A perfect day to get some traps set.

My plan is to lay a little steel on Peterson’s in the small seep that Wapiti and I discovered last year.  There won’t be many rats in there, but any is better than none.  My goal at this time is to just catch the 3 I need to pay for the gas.

I’ll pull the remainder of the traps in the Bull Arena and prepare to hit Club 41 either this afternoon or tomorrow morning.  I was waiting for a call from Richard Nicholas informing me the neighbor was ok for me to move into his place, but I have not gotten that call…so I take that as either he didn’t get hold of him, or the neighbor didn’t want me in there…either way it’s ok, I have plenty of area to trap.

Bob on the other hand is probably going to get himself into trouble.  He is out of trapping areas and wants to move his traps from the interior of Pete’s to more productive areas and I don’t blame him one bit.  Checking “dead” traps in “dead” areas is not fun and he has a lot of traps in places just like that.  He should have moved them traps a week and a half ago, but he would not listen to me.

Speaking of listening to me, he mentioned taking some floats down to the Trellis and placing them in the pond areas down there.  I warned him NOT to drive his truck down the Trellis…first off the rats have undermined the road, secondly, the gravel that has been dumped in the washed out areas is soft and third, there is nowhere for him to turn around….it all points to getting stuck or worse…sliding into the water or off the embankment on the other side and rolling his truck.  Did he listen and heed my warning?

He also mentioned driving down toward the Goose Club and setting Big Spring….Again I cautioned him that the road to the Goose Club is a mess…always…this time of year and with yesterdays rain he would get stuck big time.  He could drive a little ways as long as he stopped before crossing the stream.  At least going that far would get him closer to the trapping area and he could at least have a “chance” to get turned around to drive out.  Again, did he listen to me?

While we are talking about Bob.  He has a tough time in his old age (75) crossing barbed wire fences and he puts himself into some “sticky” situations.  Well, in this case he has a float that he placed early last Fall “across the fence” and now that it is thawed out he needs to check it daily and put bait on it.

Last week, while in the skinning shed, I suggested he use the pieces of “swimming noodles” that I had cut for my really cool floating colony trap, that didn’t work.  We cut slits in them lengthwise and I said to put them over the barbed wire and cross using them to protect him from snagging up and tearing his boots.  He had a third one that a plumber had left after some plumbing work he had done recently.  So with those three pieces of foam stuff, he created a really cool fence crossing:

Now this is a case of “Using Your Noodle”!!!!  (put smiley face here)

What can I expect today?

7 rats on Peterson’s….no rats in Bull Arena….no raccoons or skunks.

Bears Butt

March 5, 2014

P.M. REPORT

Time went really fast today…I managed to get a few more traps set in Peterson’s to finish off the line there, but don’t expect to leave the traps there more than just over night…It’s time to move on!

After pulling the traps in the Arena, there was not enough time to set any traps on Club 41, so I decided to go to Logan and pick up my new computer.  Weasel gladly joined me.

I was surprised to only catch 5 rats on Peterson’s, but more surprised to catch one in the Bull Arena and even more surprised to catch one in Doris’ pond!  For a total catch of 7 rats.

Back home Bob came in with 11 rats!  Weasels luck it way down and he had nothing.

So an 18 rat day!  We will take it!

Bears Butt

Here we go again, it’s raining like crazy!   But what do you do?  Gotta go check the traps.

Besides getting wet, what do I expect to catch today?

Well, remember I have a skunk and a raccoon in live traps and all those traps need to be recharged with new bait.

Something unusual happened yesterday as well….I have made a deal with Maveryck that since I have to turn my rig around anyway in order to check the live traps, that I would stop at his house and walk back to the shed and check in the bucket for any rats he may have caught.  I will then leave him his money underneath the bucket.  Yesterday the bucket was gone…is that his way of telling me he has pulled his traps?  I’m not sure, so I will call him today.

OK, expectancy:  I set 48 traps on Peterson’s yesterday with very little sign…Usually I could expect about 24 rats from those traps, but with so little sign, I think I’ll be lucky to catch 15 rats…I’m also thinking the whole area may only have about 30 rats total.

Nicholas’ line, all 80 some traps, will only have 4 rats and Doris’ pond and the 13 traps I have there will have one rat.  20 rats for today.  No new raccoons or skunks.

Bears Butt

March 4, 2014

P.M. REPORT

I gave the rain a little thought before leaving home and ended up putting my hip boots on and then putting my rain pants over them…The idea for that was not to have the rain pants draining the rain down into my boots…it worked.  Out on the line, I put my rain jacket over my shirt and then put my second shirt over the rain jacket.  The second shirt soaked up the water and got very wet, but no water was allowed to drain down into my shoulder length gloves.  How smart am I?

So it rained and rained while I was checking the traps at Peterson’s and just about the time I was finishing checking those traps the rain stopped and it actually got warm and sunny!  I was pretty happy and I noticed the birds were chirping alot as well, so they were happy too.

While driving out to the trapping area, there is a turn in the highway and off to the side of the road is a big field with sheep in it.  As I approached the turn I noticed the sheep all bunched up and looking in one direction.  I stopped the car and studied the field.  Suddenly I saw movement about 200 yards out….a coyote!  He must have been harassing the sheep until I stopped.  It ran a little ways and then stopped.  I got out with my pistol, slammed the clip in it and walked to the fence.  After cocking it (semi-auto), I used a fence post and aimed about 10 feet over the coyote and fired a shot.  He took off running for about 100 yards and then stopped again.  I aimed 10 feet over its head and fired again.  That time the bullet must have been pretty close, because he took off with after-burners on and didn’t stop until he was on Club 41 property.

Back at trapping…Peterson’s was just as expected…poor…14 rats got caught and only three traps set off without a rat.

I made the short jaunt over to the 3rd seep and saw quite a bit of sign there.  But I need traps.  So, I made my mind up to pull some from the Bull Arena.

At the Arena, the first three traps held two rats…I thought…Am I going to experience a run here?  And so I continued to check traps.  At trap number eight I decided I would probably not catch any more rats and that I needed to pull some traps.

I went to pulling and pulled 32 traps.  I did not catch another rat until the third to the last trap on the line….a total of 3 rats.  I will pull the remainder of those traps tomorrow in preparation to set Club 41.

On to Doris’ pond, I had one trap set off with nothing in it…that means there is one more of them in the pond.  I’ll probably keep those traps there for two more days.  Unless of course I catch a rat there tomorrow.

Richard Nicholas came over to B.S. about how the trapping was going, especially over on his place.  I showed him my tally sheet…Day one = 23 rats, Day two = 17 rats, Day three = 9 rats, Day four = 3 rats and then told him I was going to pull the remainder of the traps tomorrow and he could move his bulls back in there whenever he wanted.

In our small talk, I mentioned shooting at that coyote and he said he had just come off the mountain to the West and had seen 3 coyotes up there.  I asked him why he didn’t have a rifle with him at all times and he said he never remembers to put it in the truck before he heads out there.

He said he couldn’t believe I had caught 11 rats out of Doris’ pond and asked where they might be coming from.  I told him that during the summer past, there were probably two different families come into the pond from down stream.  He said the owner of that adjacent property would probably give me permission to trap down in there and that he would call him and find out.  Then would call me.  I hope he does as the place looks like it could hold a few rats.  It’s not a big place, but then neither is Peterson’s.  So, if that comes about, I will set some traps in there tomorrow and plan on beginning to set Club 41 on Thursday or Friday.

When the rat trapping was done I made it over to Bull Run to dump out the skunk and raccoon that I shot yesterday.  No other critters were caught.  I loaded the raccoon up and brought it home.

Back home I saw where Bob had 7 rats laying on the skinning shed floor!  So it wasn’t too bad of a day of trapping, 24 rats and one raccoon to deal with tonight.  I have not heard from the Weasel.

In the trapping shed, Weasel came in with Cody with one rat!   Cody skinned a rat last night and insisted he skin his dads rat tonight!  YEA!  Congrats to Weasel and a big YEHAAAA to Cody!

25 Rat day!

Bears Butt

Here we go into week four!  I’m writing this tonight (Sunday) as tomorrow I have to get away as quickly as possible and get on to the trapping scene.

I will be making my lunch (bologna sandwich) tonight and filling my hydration pack with water.  I have this anxiety about the run and I think this is the last full week of trapping…not because of our time available, but because the rats will do their thing and then it will be over.

I talked to Mr. Peterson about his seeps and he said “Come On”!  Since I started trapping his place 3 years ago, his place is looking better and this summer he is planning on doing some excavating around the water ways.

Last year Wapiti and I took over 100 rats off his place and he was very happy for that.  I told him that by myself, this year, I would only be able to set about 80 traps and I did not expect to catch 100 rats.  Maybe between 60 and 75.  He didn’t care, just catch what I can catch.  A rat gone is a rat gone!

So, there is my green light.  I have the traps on the toy and loaded up…I will hit Peterson’s first and then check the traps on Nicholas’ and Doris’ pond after I get some steel laid out.  I figure it will take me two days to set Peterson’s and I’ll have to pull some traps from Nicholas’ to do it.

So, what do I expect to catch tomorrow?

Well, the original 54 traps Bob and I set on Nicholas’ place netted 24 on day one and 8 on day two, so they should kick out with 5 (two nights of sitting, Saturday and Sunday).  The 27 I set the day after Bob and I were out there produced 9, which was low because of the amount of rain we had.  So, I expect to see about 10 rats in those 27 traps…so Nicholas’ place should kick out 15 rats.  Doris’ pond has been a real surprise to me and I expect 2 rats from there….17 rats tomorrow.

Up on the high land where the live traps are set, I expect 2 raccoons.

More to come tomorrow!

Bears Butt

March 2, 2014 (this is for the a.m. story on the 3rd)

P.M. REPORT

A long day out in the field today…left town at 8:15, got back at 4:30.

I managed to set 48 traps on Peterson’s today.  Now in perspective, go back to last years story on setting Peterson’s…If my recollector recollects correctly, Wapiti and I each set 40 traps…Me in one seep and he in another.  And then we set about 15 or 18 traps at the third one.  Today I covered the two big seeps with 48 traps.

They have been doing some digging on his place and trying to reclaim the dam.  There is evidence that they had it dried up and the ground cracked like it always does when it goes from very wet to very dry.  You can see the cracks in the mud under the water.

So my take on it is that we hammered the rats last year with our catch of over 100 from Peterson’s and now there are very few rats left.  The sign is very scattered and sparse.  The water is less as well on both seeps.  I didn’t go over to the third area because I ran out of traps.

Well, once finished setting traps I went and checked the Bull Arena and Doris’ pond….The Bull Arena produced 9 rats….and that is after two days….Doris’ pond once again surprised me with 5 rats!  Go figure!

The Bull Arena with sign everywhere the day(s) I set traps and over 80 traps catches 9 rats and a small pond with 13 traps catches 5…..hmmmm

What I’m seeing a the Arena is that the rats that were there have been all but caught out.  I’ll leave them set for a couple of days more, but I think I have dented them pretty good…It’s time to think about Club 41!

So as a recap:  I caught 14 rats, 1 skunk and 1 raccoon

Bob caught 14 rats and Weasel snared his masked critter…one raccoon!  Way to go Weasel!

Bears Butt

It’s Sunday and our day off from the trap line and it is very much needed after yesterday.  If you read yesterdays story, I said I was in for a relaxing sort of a day…boy howdy was that ever wrong!  Pulling and checking traps in a downpour all day long was a real Bears Butt Kicker, I’ll tell you!

These boots won’t dry out for at least a week and I hope my gloves don’t take that long.  I have a backup pair of boots and my fingers are crossed that they won’t leak.  Tomorrow will tell on that.

So, we had a pretty good week number three and ended with 179 rats!  My 3 rat day didn’t help our cause, but all a guy can do is shrug his shoulders and say…”Oh Well”!

For you with calculators going on the numbers I’ll save you some time and tell you we now have 541 rats!  Just over half way to our goal of 1,000!  If this was a normal year for weather etc. I’d say we had a pretty good shot at making the goal, but I’ve got my doubts right now.  But we won’t stop until the rats stop!

The weather for the upcoming week looks like chances of rain almost daily, but those percentage chances are less than 50% in most cases.  Yesterday’s 90% really hammered me…I felt like Ziggy with that black cloud hanging over me all day.  So, the water table should go down and expose our traps.  When I left the line yesterday, there was nothing that could be done about most of the traps being under 3 inches of water.

Also, with the slickness of the road into the Bull Arena, I’ve already decided to park the rig on the side of the highway and drive the toy in to check the traps.  I feel very fortunate to have made it in and back out without sliding off the road and down into the mud flat.  The only thing that saved me from ending up down there were the deep ruts left by others who traveled that road when it was muddy.  By the way, I did thank God for getting me in and out of there.

I mentioned in last night PM report that I got to see some more Snow Geese, I have to share with you a couple more pictures I took of them.

In this picture you have to look closely, but there are literally hundreds of those birds out in that field.  And as I sat there looking at them, more were dropping in to land.  Then something made a bunch of them fly up and I got this picture.

I know as sure as I am sitting here right now the group of hunters across the road were hoping they would come their way.  I’ve watched those hunters try their best for 3 days out there and the birds are just one step ahead of them.  I have to grin!

Bears Butt

March 2, 2014

The Eagle has landed!  But this doesn’t look like the Space Rover…or does it?

Yesterday was a very long day on the trap line and today will seem like a relaxing day….at least that’s my anticipation.  Yes, there is a lot to do, but not the pressure I felt yesterday.

Today’s goals are to pull the traps on the Trellis line, 68 of them.  I don’t expect to catch many rats from there, maybe 3 at the most.  That line has died out and we did a number on the rats.  When you look at the big picture, until yesterday all the rats we have caught up until then have come off of Pete’s place…450 of them and still counting.  The rats Bob will take for the rest of the trapping season will also come from Pete’s.  My lines will take me off of Pete’s and onto other places.

We have talked and with the swelling of the musk glands and the warmness of the weather, we feel the run is about to over take us.  With that will come the end of the trapping season.  When the run happens, we catch a ton of rats in a hurry and then….nothing…..That is just the way it is.

Changing subjects a little:  I was curious to see what the rats looked like on Nicholas’s place…it’s a small seep from it’s beginning to the end and has been for centuries.  The rats there are all inbred for those many years.  So, will the rats be small or large?  That was my question.  When I pulled the first rat out yesterday I was pleasantly surprised to find it a GIANT!  And so it was with the rest of the rats I caught…the smallest was a Large and one from the mix stretched just slightly larger than 17 1/2 inches and pristine as they come…no bite marks.

I don’t plan on setting any traps today and if you look at the count, I now have over 150 traps out.  One would think I could catch 75 rats right?  Not so.

Today is Saturday, the end of week 3 of trapping.  It was windy and rainy last night and still is today.  90% chance of rain and up to 1/2 inch expected.  What will my line net me?

3 from the Trellis, 10 from the 54 traps I set two days ago on Nicholas’s, 10 from the 27 I set yesterday on Nicholas’s and one from the 13 traps I set at Doris’ pond…24 rats today.  Because of the rain and wind I don’t expect to catch any raccoons or skunks.

Bears Butt

March 1, 2014

P.M. REPORT

Oh my heck!  What a rain storm!  I got so wet I could hardly move!  I put on all my rain gear and braved it out…I did get my traps pulled from the Trellis  and to my very much surprised face…I caught 9 rats!  Almost like a mini-run!

Then 0ff to the Promontory Mountain to check the real line.

The rain was pelting down so hard I could hardly see the road.  Crazy rain!

I pulled into the dirt road and started to spin immediately.  I put it into auto 4 wheel drive and barely made it up a slight incline to some ground with grass and solid footing.  The old truck and trailer barely made it.

I got out and prepared myself for “rain”….I put on all my rain stuff…rain pants, rain coat, rain hat, rain glasses, rain boots, rain gloves, rain happy face…did I say it was raining?

Then I took a deep breath and said to myself…well Butt, you’re here, you might as well go check some traps.  It was raining so hard by now I wasn’t sure the toy would even start and when it did, I ventured toward where I knew the first trap was.  What an adventure.  When it was over, I had my left boot half full of water, my right foot was wet and sloshy, but I did manage to catch 17 rats!  With my hat dripping water and my clothes soaking wet I made it back to the truck and fired the muthu up.  I was freezing!

Over to Doris’ pond, I caught 5 rats!!!  FIVE! Crazy huh?

Heading home I called Weasel to find out if his schedule would allow him to skin rats earlier than 5:30, so that maybe, just maybe we could have an evening with our spouses…He could…At home we started skinning our rats and put up rats from yesterday until about 6:30…perfect!

So the catch for the day!  Me 31, Bob 9, Weasel 1…41 rat day!

And look at this!

Too bad the hunters were on the other side of the road!  HAHAHAHAHA!

Bears Butt

One of the perks of trapping this time of year is seeing the snow geese migrate through.  This picture isn’t the best, as I took it with my phone camera but you can still see a large group of geese on the ground and some in the air.  They have to be the noisiest birds in the world.  The really funny thing about this band of geese is that just about 300 yards away there were some hunters set up and the geese just would not go in their direction.

Another subject on a water trapping line is boots.  Hip boots, waders, chest waders, whatever you want to call them and whatever style suits your fancy; unless you want to be wet and cold and miserable, you will wear boots.

Last year you will recall my purchase of the most expensive boots I have ever bought…Godwin Muck Boots…they had high praise in the web world and most people rated them 5 stars…I had a different experience and mine leaked.  I called the company I bought them through and sent them back…they in turn sent me another pair.  It was too late in the season to try them out and so I stored them, out of the box mind you, in my basement.  They were NOT folded in any way, but stored in their length, out of the sun and in the cool of the basement.

They leak.

I’m not happy with these boots and neither is Bob, who purchased a pair just like mine thinking they were some good looking, hard wearing boots.  So, my assumption is THEY ALL LEAK!  Period.

In my weak mind way, I have opted not to bother the company with my complaint again, but I did contact them and tell them that their leaking boots could cause someone on a very cold trap line to get hypothermia and they should recall all their boots.  Nuff said.

So, while in Walmart the other day, I saw a can of spray leak stopping rubber and I bought it.

When I got home I took my boots out and hung them in the tree and sprayed the upper portions of the boots, where the water comes in, my hope is that it will seal them up and keep me from getting wet.

Yesterday I had one heck of a time getting them to fold down so I could get my foot in them, but finally managed.  By the time the trapping was done, however, they folded down just fine.  Did my legs get wet?  I’m not sure, because it was raining so danged hard I was soaked from head to toe and that could have been the cause.  So the jury is still out.  Today the chance of rain is only 30%, so I’ll probably be able to put the boots to a true test.

So, what can I expect today?

Well, I feel pretty confident on the traps we set in the Bull Arena yesterday.  So confident in fact I bet Bob a 25 ounce beer I would come home with “at least 31 rats” today.

In addition to the rats, I have two skunks I have to dump out of their live traps and re-bait for raccoons.  I think I probably will have caught one raccoon today as well.

Bears Butt

February 28, 2014…If you had plans to get something done in February, today is your last day to get it done!  Just sayin!

P.M. REPORT

Surprised again out on the trap line!

I headed straight out with an extra 40 Conibear traps and decided to set traps before I checked traps.  I managed to set an additional 27 traps, extending the line from where we ended yesterday (in Bull Arena) to the end of the line.  Then I went back to the top and began checking the traps we set yesterday.  I thought for sure we had set nearly 70 traps yesterday, but when I counted them we had only set 54 (which is a lot of traps, but not nearly as many as 70)….so with my beer making bet with Bob at a very bad compromise, I went to checking traps….I ended with 23 rats!  Pretty much on line with a first checking of 54 traps..27 would have been 50%, and I did have 3 or 4 other traps set off with nothing in them.  Well I lost the beer bet.

Then I headed over to Doris’ pond to set what I could there.  By this time it was getting windy, cold and late.  I went around the West edge carrying 10 Conibears, but soon decided it would be better to go around the pond with no traps and mark the places to put traps.  So, back to the rig I went and dropped off the Conibears.

You have to understand this pond…it’s not very big, maybe 3/4 acre in size, but it is completely encircled with tumble weeds that have blown into it…all around the edges.  It is also very deep, with steep sides, because of last summers dredging work.  Yes, there are some weeds, toolies and other water type plants growing in and around the pond, but it is not easy to find places to set traps.

Well after making my way around the pond, I could see I needed 2 bait sets and 11 Conibears…I gathered them up and went to work.  After setting the last trap, and as I was walking back to the rig, I started counting the flags as a final check as to how many traps I had set.  What to my bewilderment did I see, but way across the pond the water near one of the flags was splashing.

I went over there and there was a muskrat, dead as dead!

It seems like every year there is some strange thing like this that happens and this was a great one!  Last year I only caught one rat out of this pond and so far this year I have caught one…on set day no less!

So, my total for the day ended up to be 24, while Bob caught 12.

I must say, his line is holding up well!  A 36 rat day is a great trapping day in anyone’s book.  No raccoons, no skunks and no rats in Mavryks bucket.

Bears Butt

Yesterdays pretty scene.

It’s Thursday and Bob and I are prepared to head way out West…The Bull Arena awaits our presence.

It’s going to be very interesting to see if there are any rats in that little bit of water.  Last Spring I could see several rat houses out there and that was from the road.  The thing(s) that kept me from entering the field and trapping it were the bulls….have I told y0u of my fear of bulls?  It think I have.  And unlike the scene I saw yesterday with Bob ignoring the bulls…

If I were in his shoes right there, I would be having a heart attack….look what was across that little seep of water:

They are very interested in Bob at this moment. (CSR stands for “Chit, Scared, Run”, not really it just applies to me)

Well, we don’t have to contend with bulls in the Bull Arena, as Richard Nicholas has taken them out just so we can trap it.  A couple of years ago, he and I had a very good heart to heart conversation about “fears”…My fear is bulls and his fear is “rats”….so we have a mutual feeling and for him to give me permission to trap those rats was a given.

We want to totally wipe out every rat in that area and it should be pretty easy to do.  The water way is only about 500 yards long, from the spring at the top, to where ever the water goes at the very end.  For some odd reason, all the water out in that part of the country just comes to an end…not like it goes into the Great Salt Lake, it just plain ends.

So, even though it is slated to rain today (90%), and we can expect to get soaked, we are going out with the intention of setting about 80 traps in that little area.  With that many traps out we should wipe out the population of rats in about 4 days.  Hang with me and I’ll let you know how we do.

As for todays catch:

With yesterdays surprise number, and last nights winds and building clouds, I think we can expect to only catch about half what we did yesterday.  So, I’m saying I’ll catch 7…I hope I’m wrong.  Oh and I’ll get a raccoon too.

Bears Butt

February 27, 2014

P.M. REPORT

Got back home at 4:55…a very long day in the field.

Bob and I set “A Bunch” of traps in the Arena today…all the Conibear traps I had on the toy and I think that was 60, but I’m not sure.  We ran out of time and traps at the same time.  Tomorrow I will set more.

There was so much sign of rats in that small ditch it is crazy….I don’t think it has ever been trapped.  Bob could not believe it either.

Meanwhile up on the Trellis, I caught 3 rats….that’s it.  In the live traps one skunk…pewwwwww!

As I was about to leave the area the rain had been coming down steady and I was soaked, then the North wind came up and the temperature dropped at least 15 degrees, to the point I could see my breath…I’m still cold right now.

Bob caught 12 rats on his line and he is feeling really good right now…he is regularly kicking my butt!

Bears Butt