Like many of you, I see lots of survival trapping articles cross my inbox. I also watch TV shows like Alone, Naked and Afraid, and others like them. As a fur trapper, I must say the survival trapping I see in all of these mediums is flat-out WRONG. I hope more survivalists will seek trapping instruction, because I’ve seen some damn good competitors go home because they can’t catch food.
*So what are they doing wrong?*
Snares. Snares. Snares. I see tons of snares on survival trapping sites. Probably because cordage of some kind is easy to carry in a survival kit, I get it. And snares are actually very good traps, with high catch ratios. This is because they’re blind sets. More on that later.
Let’s talk about animal behavior and trapping for starters. To catch animals you need two things. First you need animals to be present. Second, you need them to get into your trap. Most beginners have a little trouble with the first, and almost EVERYBODY has trouble with the second.
So how do you know if animals are around? Well, if you’re in the woods, start by looking for trails. Like most of us, animals like an easy path. They generally aren’t going to traverse thick undergrowth, so look for trails. And the bigger the trail, the more travelled it is, usually. When I drive from Texas to Florida I like to take I-10 as much as I can, I don’t generally take little 2 lane roads. Find trails by looking a little way off from you, look out a bit. In foliage, when looking close around yourself, trails may be hard to spot. But when you look off into the distance, they tend to stand out. You’ll see them. Animals use them, so remember that.
Another tell-tale sign is scat. Scat of course, is turds. Learn to spot the turds of the prey you’re after and simply look for it. You know what? It will often be in trails! Rabbits have little black pebble type turds, predators look like dog crap but usually have hair in it. Deer and goats look like large oval rabbit turds, just google it. It’s not hard.
Also tracks are a dead giveaway. If an animal is in the area, generally they’ll leave tracks. If it’s snowy or muddy especially. Look for tracks that look fresh. Fresh tracks will have more definition to the edges, and will generally be deeper and more defined. The holy trinity is if I see tracks and scat on a trail SET THAT LOCATION!
So How Do I Get The Animal In The Trap?
OK, we’re SURE there are animals in the area. We may even have seen the holy trinity of sign, right? So I guess we just lay out a 550 paracord loop and they’ll blindly walk into it won’t they? I mean they’re just stupid, unenlightened animals who don’t know paracord from a farm truck, right?
WRONG!
This is the biggest problem I see with survival traps. They are huge monstrous mechanical contraptions with trigger sticks and thick cord right in plain sight. ANIMALS KNOW THIS ISN’T NATURAL! Animals are not blind, and although they don’t write poetry and create art, they can damn sure see a man-made contraption! They won’t blindly just walk into anything, or poke their head into anything, just because there’s food there. No matter how much you love McDonald’s, if you came home and all of your furniture was moved in your living room, and there was a happy meal box in the center of the room would you suspect something was wrong? You bet! So would just about any animal. They have intuition, and their own form of intelligence. Instinct, even.
If you set a trap like this, with bait, you are counting not only on the animal being there BUT ON THE ANIMAL DOING SOMETHING, USUALLY SOMETHING THAT IT WOULDN’T NATURALLY DO.
We face this as coyote trappers, we set intricate sets with holes in the ground and bait, and steel traps buried in the ground. We try to make all of this invisible to the animal, but at the end of the day we’re trying to make an animal do something. We’re trying to make it dig, or step, or do something else that it may or may not be naturally inclined to do at that moment. This makes trapping 100% harder.
Why Not Trap The Animal Just Because He’s There?
It would be so much easier to simply trap the animal just because he’s in the area. It’s hard enough to catch him, but trying to make him behave in a manner he wouldn’t normally make it even tougher.
This is where blind sets come in. A blind set (we call a trap and it’s immediate surroundings a ‘set’) is exactly what it’s name implies. The animal can’t see it, and gets caught just by being there. This is where trails come in. Most animals are happily bounding down the trail, on the way to a mate or food or hunting or whatever.
If you’re setting a snare, set it in the trail. Preferably set it in a choke point, where the trail narrows. If there is tall grass beside the trail, set the snare in the trail and then brush up the grass to hide it. If an animal sees the trap it will avoid it, but if the animal is running down the same trail he’s run as long as he remembers, he won’t slow and the snare will work. I still recommend using commercial snares, made from stranded aircraft cable. Paracord is flimsy, and picture hanging wire is just stupid. Anything worth catching will twist out of that. When you catch an animal, even if you check traps every 24 hours, that is a long time for the animal to gnaw and pull on your cord. Use something that works.
There are tricks and tips that can help you use nature to force an animal to step where you want it to. Is there a low overhang over the trail? Great. He’s probably used to ducking that anyway. Prime place to set a snare. If you’re using foothold traps, getting an animal to step where you want can be tricky. But you can put a small stick/branch across the trail, and as long as it’s not too big to force the animal to veer off it will 95% of the time step over it. I catch lots of raccoons this way. Also, if there is an overhang, a deer will jump it but coons and hogs will go under. Trying to catch coyotes? Try this: Put a coyote turd in the path. Set a trap. Put another turd after the trap. Coyotes don’t like stepping in crap any more than you or I so either way they’re coming down the trail they’ll step over the turd and into your trap.
Hopefully these tips can help your survival trapping be more successful. Contact us if you have trapping questions!
