A fast moving storm moved across the mountains, dumping heavy wet
snow. The eight Mountain Men had made an almost fatal error. They
stayed too
long in the high country. Now cut off from retreating from the
mountains they must survive and winter in this valley high in the
mountains
in what is today Wyoming. The pass was filled with eight feet of
wind drift snow that no man or beast could enter or leave until the
Spring thaw.
The eight men decide to spend the week hunting for food to store
for winter. At the end of the week only one small deer was taken.
All
the hunting parties reported the same thing, the valley was empty
of large game. At the end of the second week there food was completely
out and the men were hungry and cold. Finally one man suggest that
they trap the beaver for food. Throughout the winter they caught
enough
to survive. Not enough to make and easy living but enough to pull
through the brutal winter. A early spring thaw in March open the
pass and
a small of herd of 11 buffalo enter the valley. Soon the buffalo
were turned into steaks and roasts. The men had survived the winter
of 1804-05.
I read this account years ago and it has effect my life in many
ways. Many lessons are taught in this short story. The unprepared
can die. Counting on harvesting large game is not always possible.
When hunting fails their traps saved their lives. Today we have more
modern
equipment
lightweight snares that can catch and hold the animals. How to set
these snares is simple. First you need to understand the basic
parts. On one end is swivel. This so the animal can twist without
breaking the cable. The next part is called a support collar it looks
like a small piece of spring. The support collar job is to hook on
to the support wire to hold the snare at the correct height. Next
is the self-locking snare lock. There are different types of snare
locks. Some such as the cam lock are designed
to kill the animal. Others are designed to relax
once the animal is caught, like a choke collar.
Say that you want to snare the raccoon that is coming into a corn field.
You walk the edge of the woods and find the trail entering the field.
Normally the coons will leave sign on what trail they are using like
pieces of corn stalk and if you follow the trail in sometimes you
find a pile of rocks or log with pile of corn cobs around it. The
coons
do this a lot in coyote areas. They are vulnerable to coyote attacks
in the open so they learn to grab a corn cob and enter the woods
climbing on a rock pile so they can watch for coyotes as they eat.
On this trail
you will find a place to set the snare where the trail is narrow
down. Like between two small trees or under a fallen branch, limb,
or tree.
You can anchor the snare with 1/2" steel rebar stake.
Or go around a tree feeding the snare lock through the snare swivel.
Open the
snare
to an 8 inch loop and set it three inches off the ground. You can
use light wire like 14 gauge wrap around the tree with a small piece
coming off. Bend this over at the end and feed it into the support
collar. That is it. When the coons comes down the trail he walks
into the
snare
and is
caught.
Snaring is literally that simple. No big secret trick to it. Now
using scent lure to help increase your odds of catching animals.
Lure are designed
to attract the animal to the snare or trap. Normally lures are made
out of 4-to-6 different ingredients. The difference between us and
animals is that animals smell so much better, so they can tell each
different part of the lure. Animals just like people have different
taste.
You might
like Pizza Hut and your friend would prefer McDonalds. By having
the different ingredients you cover a wider choice for the animals.
Basically
you cover something that will cause the vast majority of the animals
to come visit the set. The lures are high concentration and designed
to last for years and years. When using snares it is a good idea
to place a small amount on a cotton ball on each side of the snare.
Not
real close to the snare about 2-3 feet on either side of the snare.
This increases the odds that the animal will take the trail your
snare is on.
Now when using a conibear trap you normally want the lure on the
other side or behind the trap so the animal is trying to pass through
the
trap to get to the lure. My bucket set (as seen in my Beginning
Trapping DVD) and some raccoon lure placed on a cotton ball.
Toss the cotton ball behind the trap. This has caught thousands of
coons for my students. One
real
good friend
caught
a 39 pound coon using this system. When other folks ask what he uses
for bait and lure, he says that he "...can't remember." Like
a fishermen, he told me, he has kept his lure secret so he could
catch more
animals.
:-)
Just like any fast moving storm you too may be caught in a life or
death struggle. Remember the old Mountain Man story the traps are
why they survived the winter. Today, other factors can be just as
fatal as being trapped
in a mountain valley for the winter. Today it could be the Bird Flu,
terrorist attack, economic collapse, etc. The old Boy Scout motto
applies: always be prepared because as
we have seen, being unprepared could be
a fatal mistake. - Buckshot (Of Buckshot's
Camp: http://www.buckshotscamp.com)