Today is Presidents Day and what that means the most to me is the kids are out of school!  YEEAAAA!  At least that is what they are saying.  But bigger than that is the fact that I’ve been trying to figure out a day that Kenzie could go trapping with me.  She asked me about two weeks ago, just after I started trapping this year, when I was going to let her go out trapping with me.  Well, today is the day.  It wasn’t decided until last night, but she jumped on the chance when I asked her.

She has no clue where in the world this trapping place is and so she will learn a thing or two about the geographics of the area around us, to include Stinky Springs and Connor Springs, just to name two.

I am in hopes that she gets to see a trapped raccoon as well.

OK, what are my expected catches for today, after two days of sitting out?  Well, the nine floats I put out each have two traps on them.  I do expect to catch a rat in each of those traps.  There is 18 rats.  The 8 other traps I set should yield the typical 50%…so add another 4 rats.  The traps at Fish Springs have been paying off really well, but I’m catching rats faster there than expected and so I do expect there not to be too much out of those 18 traps…let’s say 6 from there.  That leaves that raccoon infested Bull Run and even though I have already caught a record number of rats from there, I should get 6 or 7 good rats…I’ll gamble with 7.  There you have it, 18 + 4 + 6 + 7 = 35………..That is saying alot!  And then if Bob catches is usual 10 or so, we are going to be in the skinning shed a looonnnnggggg time tonight.

Bears Butt

February 16, 2015

UPDATE:

Boy Howdy was I up in the night when it comes to catching rats!  When Kenzie and I got to the floats……There wasn’t any water!!!!!

Craig had me pull one of the boards that blocked one of two pipes and almost all the water drained out from where it was backed up!  My floats were high and dry and one was even about waste high when I went out to pull it back to find another place for it.  We ended up re-setting them in water that is flowing here and there, but I also am going to swag a bunch of traps out while the water is down.  I should catch a lot of rats before Craig decides the board needs to go back in.  They have moved all their cattle from that side of the road and so his attention should be elsewhere, and that should give me time to catch a bunch of rats.  Those rats will be all confused about where the water went and should be looking to plug the hole!  Mini beavers you know!

So, where I had been figuring 18 rats, we caught 3!  With the way things were, I feel very lucky to have caught 3.

So, on to the rest of the lines and things were looking bleak down on Fish Springs.  Nothing in the first 9 traps and then we picked up 4 rats in the last 9 traps!  YEA!  Coming back toward the truck and with 8 traps out, we caught 4 more for a total of 11 rats.  Then on over to Bull Run.

I told Kenzie where the live traps were and asked her to go check them while I loaded up the toy with two more live traps.  She went that direction but when she saw rat carcasses scattered all around it sort of freaked her out a bit and she spent some time talking to herself.  She did say, as I approached, there was something furry in one of the traps but that she thought it was a cat.  I reassured her it if was a cat I would let it go unharmed.  Turns out it was a raccoon….FINALLY!  She didn’t want to see the results of a 22 flying through its head and opted to go back to the truck….fine by me.

So we went on our way to check Bull Run….final result….6 good rats and 5 more lost to those miserable raccoons!  I did set two more live traps and skinned the two rats to bait them up while out there in the swamp.

Things are looking slim on Bull Run now.  Very little to no sign and it is wasting my time to check it any longer.  I’m going to pull the traps there but will leave the live traps to catch coons.  It will be worth the stop to unload the toy and check them if I can catch a bunch more raccoons.  I hate raccoons about as much as I hate moving snow or dealing with bulls.

Back home, Bob had gone out trapping yesterday and brought 6 rats back, today he had 5 more to add to the collection!

Kenzie, bless her heart, wanted to skin a muskrat and came up to the skinning shed and did just that!  With a little instruction, she had number one rat skinned in a relatively short time and she did a perfect job!  Nose, Whiskers, Eyes and Ears!  Then she put another one in her lap and did that one just as good!  She earned herself an easy $1 for doing those two rats!  Good Job Kenzie!

Bears Butt