SCENT AND DECOYS.
It is claimed by trappers that some methods are good while others are
not. I have bought nearly all of the methods put on the market and
find that all are good if properly used, says a well known trapper.
Experience has taught me that you can catch any kind of an animal
with decoy. Experience has also taught me that you can catch any kind
of an animal without decoy. My belief is that there is one decoy that
is of great value, especially in the running season, and it is that
of the famous beaver castor. Few animals can pass it without
investigating.
You can, however, use all the decoys put together, and if you do not
set the trap properly you might as well set traps on top of a straw
stack, back of some barn, to catch a fox, and you will get him just
as quick. But if your trap is set somewhere near his haunts, on a
knoll or under vines, at a hollow stump, tree or hole, and baited
with a good piece of fresh bait, you will catch just as many if not
more in the fall, than you will with the decoy.
[Illustration: CAUGHT WHERE SCENT IS MUCH USED.]
In winter and spring I prefer decoy, although I have caught a good
many foxes without it. During winter and spring, the main thing is to
know just how and where to set the trap. The best way to find this
out is to study the animal you wish to catch, then go after him. A
fox is almost as easy to catch as a skunk if you conceal your trap,
chain and all, and leave things as you found them around the trap.
It is well to buy some good methods, for they will give you a good
idea of your work and help you get a start. Should you try them and
fail the first time, try again. Keep right at trying and after a
while you will get to catching foxes. There is no man that can use
another man's methods as well as the discovered himself; at least,
not until he learns them and finds out how to use them. I care not
how plainly the one selling his method explains it to others, it
takes practice before the best catches can be made.
* * *
About scents, some may be good, but most of them are worthless. I
sent to an old trapper for mink scent and it came in a plain tin can,
I used it in every way I could and mink would turn and go around it,
so I stopped using it and took to the old Scotch scent. Here is the
recipe for making it:
Take two dozen minnows three inches long, put in two quart cans
filled with water and seal. Let stand one month in warm place, then
put on bait for mink or skunk. I use no scent for mink in water sets.
If a mink is hungry, writes an Iowa trapper, and finds bait that has
been left for him, he will pay no attention to human scent, while if
he is not hungry, he will not take the bait, be it ever so fresh. A
mink will sometimes make a trail in the fresh snow by passing several
times over the same route and then never use that trail again. I have
also known otter to do the same. I caught two mink last winter, in a
ditch, setting my trap in the water. The first night I caught a
medium-sized mink and the third night I caught a small one. I believe
that I would have caught every mink that went up that ditch if it had
not froze up, and snowed so much during the time, that I could not
keep my traps properly set. If a person sets out a line of traps in
this country while there is snow on the ground, he is simply going to
a great deal of trouble to give them to some thief.
In trapping mink I watch for signs and when I locate a mink I
consider it mine and it generally is. If you bait a trap where you
may think it is a good place to catch a mink, it often happens that
you may make a good many trips to your trap and not succeed. You may
say to yourself that it is human scent that keeps them away, when
perhaps there has not been a mink near your trap. My advice to young
trappers is not to set your traps where a mink may go, but set it
where you know he is going, and you will find it no trick to catch
mink.
[Illustration: YOUNG TRAPPERS DISCUSSING SCENT.]
In writing about "Mistakes of Trappers" an Alleghany Mountain trapper
of fifty years' experience says: The average trapper makes a mistake
in listening to some one's ideas about scents for trapping an animal,
instead of going to the forests, the fields and the streams and there
learning its nature, its habits and ways, and its favorite food. He
also makes a mistake by spending much time in looking after scents,
rubber gloves to handle traps with, and wooden pinchers to handle
bait with, instead of spending his time in learning the right way and
the right place to set his trap. For one little slip and the game is
gone, if the trap is not properly set.
We make mistakes in thinking that the fox is more sly in some states
than in others. Not long ago I received a letter from a friend in
Maine asking if I did not think that the fox was harder to trap in
some states than others, Now the states in which I have trapped are
rather limited, but I have trapped in Wisconsin, Michigan and
Pennsylvania, mostly Pennsylvania. I have also trapped in one or two
other states and wherever I found the fox, I found the same sly
animal and in order to trap it successfully it was necessary to
comply with the natural conditions.
[Illustration: TEACHING THE BOY ART OF TRAPPING.]
The worst mistake of all mistakes is made by the one who uses poison
to kill foxes with. Let me tell you of an instance that came under my
observation four years ago in the southern part of this county. My
road was over the divide between the waters of the Alleghany and
Susquehanna. About five miles of the road lay over a mountain that
was thickly wooded, with no settlers. While crossing this mountain I
saw the carcasses of four foxes lying in the road. On making
inquiries I learned that a man living in the neighborhood was making
a practice each winter of driving over the roads in that section and
putting out poisoned meat to kill foxes.
I chanced to meet this man not long ago and I said, "Charley, what
luck did you have trapping last winter?" His reply was, "Not much,
only two foxes. Old Shaw dogged them out of the country." (Referring
to a man who hunted with dogs.) I said, "Charley, don't you think
that poison business had something to do with it?" He replied, "Oh,
h--l, there will be foxes after I am dead." This man calls himself a
trapper and is quite an extensive fur buyer.
* * *
For fox decoy, get five or six musk glands from rats in the
springtime; put enough trout or angle worms with them to make a pint,
cork them tight and leave in the sun thru the summer, and add the
essence from one skunk (squeeze out the essence, don't put in the
bag). I have never seen a better decoy and I have used many. You can
use either one alone. I have caught many foxes with trout oil alone.
Remember the bait and scent is no good whatever as long as there
remains a trace of human odor; the whole secret is, _Be Careful_.
The beaver castors or bark sacks and the oil stones are found near
the vent in four sacks in both male and female. In taking them out,
cut clear around them, and take all out together with as little meat
as possible. The bark sacks contain a yellow substance. To get the
contents, tie a string around the hole in the sacks and rub them
between the hands until soft, then cut them open and squeeze the
contents into a glass jar or bottle. To get the oil from the oil
stone, cut the end off and squeeze it. Keep separate and mix as
directed:
1st. Take the castor of one beaver, add 20 drops oil of cinnamon, 10
drops oil Anise, and "wine" of beaver to make the bait thick like
mush.
2nd. Take the castor sacks of one beaver, add 7 drops of oil
sassafras, 7 drops Anise, 10 drops oil from the oil stone.
3rd. Take the castor sacks of one beaver, add 10 drops of Jamaica
rum, 5 drops oil of Anise, 5 drops oil cloves, 5 drops oil sassafras,
5 drops oil Rhodium.
4th. Take the castor sacks of one beaver, add 10 drops oil from the
oil stones, and beaver's urine enough to make the bait like mush.
* * *
For beaver bait, get six castors off of beavers, one nutmeg, 12
cloves, 30 grains or cinnamon and mix up with a little whiskey to
make in a paste or like mixed mustard. Put in a bottle and cork. In a
few days it will get strong, then use as a bait on pan of trap.
You catch no foxes if there is any human scent around, says an
Eastern trapper. I will tell you how I set a trap for fox in a brook
of running water. Have your trap free from rust (beeswax is good to
prevent rust on a trap); have on a pair of water-proof boots, put the
bait on a rock about two feet from shore, and set trap on a rock
three inches from shore. Cover trap about one inch with moss; have it
rise above water, and place a rock for reynard to step on before he
steps onto the trap rock. Put a few drops of scent on the bait, of
the right kind, and be sure the trap is under water; handle bait and
moss with sharp stick. Now I am sure you would catch no fox if you
worked from the bank. Always walk in water when going to trap.
I will give a pointer on using decoys or scent for making trails,
writes a Western trapper. Take a piece of sponge, run stout string
thru it, pour on your medicine and then place the sponge in the
hollow of the sole of your rubber boot, bring the ends of the string
up over the instep, cross them and tie on the back side of the boot
and it will make a trail that a mink or coon will follow a mile or
more.
[Illustration: TRAPPER'S HOME IN COLORADO.]
The slyer animals, such as the fox and mink, soon learn to associate
all fancy smells with danger, and then most scents act as warning
instead of a lure, writes an Ohio trapper. For mink bait I think a
fresh muskrat carcass is about the best of anything, because muskrat
is their common food and therefore they are not nearly as liable to
be suspicious of it as of some strange scent, such as amber oil,
anise oil, oil of cinnamon or oil of lavender, one or more of which
is nearly always used in combination scents.
I generally take a hen carcass, smear it with the musk of a muskrat,
and use it for a drag, as it will make a trail that a mink is pretty
sure to follow to the trap which should be set in a hole near an old
stump or log if such a hole can be found, and then covered with fine
dry dirt, rotten wood or what is better than either, the feathers
from the chicken carcass which has been used as a drag. I find it a
better way to cut the bait into small pieces and use several pieces
with each trap, but if only one piece is used it is best to stake it
fast. If an animal only has to make one trip into the enclosure to
get all the bait he will not be as apt to be taken as if he made
several trips, which he is pretty sure to do if the bait is cut into
small pieces and scattered around in the enclosure.
There seems to be quite a difference of opinion among trappers as to
the "attractive" value of Scents and Decoys. Some praise them, while
others consider them of little value.
In our years of experience as Editor of the H-T-T we have read
thousands of trappers' letters from all parts of America, which in
addition to personal observation when on the trapping line, enables
us to say that "Scents" and "Decoys," if rightly made, prepared and
used are of value.
There is no question but that the sexual organs of the female secured
"when in heat" and preserved in alcohol is a great lure for the males
of that specie.