Muskrat Porn
 

I caught a couple of monsters last night and one really tiny one. There goes my average.....lol!

http://i743.photobucket.com/albums/x...psc30d1de4.jpg

Right on DAVE

Good show!

Rats
 

Isn't it a bit early to be trapping rats are they prime yet? In Sask. The season doesn't open till the 15th and even then there not very prime

In the zone that I'm trapping it opened yesterday. South of here it opens on October 15th.

No, they won't start being prime until February so 2 weeks doesn't make a difference. You will only lose about $2 less per pelt before then but you can make up for that by catching them in big numbers during the Fall. Also, a lot of the rats that you catch in the Fall will have already died if you wait until they are prime. In one location that I'm trapping they wouldn't even make it until then before dying.

Awesome Dave. you got a head start on me bud lol I found my fall rats didn't loose all that much for price. Clean out the shallow ponds and ditches while you can.

Way to go! You're off to a great start.

x2 soon as the Oct 15 comes i'm trapping Rats,my fall rats did well last year,Nube's right i'm going to obtain while I can get them,instead of the waste that will surely come if I wait til spring,they won't be around in spring in couple area's I trap,they will have winter killed,cheers Peter

I have to admit that I was a little disappointed with my catch rate (only about 25%) but I was happily surprised that I caught some decent sized ones. I was thinking that I'd be catching a lot more smaller juvenile ones.

It's a learning process for me and the major thing that I found out today is that rats don't like dining in the wind. All of my sets that were in the wind weren't touched but I was getting doubles on a lot of floats that were sheltered. I moved a half dozen float sets and that should remedy that. I also didn't do well in the drainage ditch going only 3 rats for 12 sets. I'll leave them there for the time being, landowner will be happy, but if it remains the same they'll be moved to the big slew with the rest.

Other lessons learned were.....It's easier to row than walk and rats love pears. :)

Amassing what you can learn on here. Staying out of the wind i can understand, but pears? What ever made you think of using pears?
Congrats on a great start to the season.

Putting the pears from our tree to use. :)

right on! looking forward to your "end of the line" pic

Gonna be spending some time in the skinning shack today but it's -7 with frost so I'll have to get that heater going I guess. I took about 30 Spring rat pelts out of the freezer to board but I doubt that they thawed. I'll check after a coffee. :)

Right on. I was checking in to see how you did with the check. Keep putting pics up, good to see.

For bait I use carrots. It is cheap. I also use a lure from Halfords in a bottle and an orange / pink label that smells like peppermint. It is the lure I found to be the most help Pears could get pricey

Well looks like 4 RCMP hats right there Dave, good on ya!

I put a piece of carrot on the trigger of my 110's on my float sets. The pears that I'm using are from our tree out back so they are free. They're only small compared to what you see in the stores but they have a strong, pleasant smell. I still have 3 shopping bags of them. Thanks for the tip on the peppermint scent, I'll remember that for the future.

I just got back from my check, having a coffee and then it's out to the skinning shed to flesh/board about 30 of my Spring rats that I had in the freezer. I got 0 rats out of my 12 float sets in the ditch.....it had iced over. I'll be moving those sets to the large slew Monday. There are too many duck/goose hunters out there on the weekend and I'd like to be as discrete as possible. I got 2 rats in my colony traps at a 3rd location and I'll be putting out more of them on Monday.

As for my 12 float sets in the large slough, first I checked 2 sets about 100 yards away from the other 10 and,........nothing. I went to check the other 10 sets and I caught 14 rats......Nice! Wanna guess where my sets from the ditch are going.....lol! Total today......16 but once I adjust things I should be able to improve a lot on that.

Lesson learned......If using leg hold traps on float sets make sure to put a good pile of weeds between the two traps as a barrier otherwise one trapped rat may set off the second trap before jumping off the float. :sign0161:

While scouting around the slough looking for a good location to put my 12 sets from the ditch I found this bad boy. :)

http://i743.photobucket.com/albums/x...ps3a7f719d.jpg

Nice work dave keep it up thats a great start

Just curious, would anyone know how many rats it'd take to make this hut and how many rats would utilize it?

5 per hut that size is how I judge it

While I commend your prowess, I must express my unhappiness with this thread.

The subject title suggested something more.... spicy...

The shed is starting to look much better now. It looked a little empty before. :)

http://i743.photobucket.com/albums/x...ps5b09a82a.jpg

Looks good Dave

Me jelous right now. :) Thanks Dave keep going bud. I bet your having fun:sHa_shakeshout:

The new skinning shack is getting full. Keep at er, love seeing the pics.

what percentage of small rats are you catching? How are they for primeness? Itching to go here. Might set some coyote snares first. Neighbor has been losing sheep and geese.

I'm right around where it should be, about 70% juveniles and 30% adults. I've caught 2 or 3 really small ones that must have been from a second litter this summer. There is a very healthy population of rats where I am trapping.

I don't have enough experience to determine their primeness, this is my first Fall trapping. The smallest are blue, the older juveniles have the long blotch down their back and the adults have blotches. I fleshed and boarded 22 Spring rats yesterday that didn't have any markings.

I'll go take a picture and you can tell me what you think.

Here's an example of what I've been catching. The one on the left is the smallest that I caught and I'm thinking that it's one from a second litter of the summer. The middle 2 are typical of the juveniles that I have caught which is about 70% of my catch. The one on the right is typical of the adults that I've caught and the one at the bottom is a Spring rat from the freezer.

http://i743.photobucket.com/albums/x...pse7642674.jpg

Well I went out to check up on my rat sloughs and it's depressing out of 15 ponds and sloughs I checked I seen 3 rats and one feed pile. I might wait another till the 20th of Oct. I see they are still a little to black for what I like. But fall rats are that way as it is.

Coy, I hadn't seen any around here during the day at all. I put 10 floats sets out in one spot and the next day I got 16 rats out of them. I haven't seen many huts either but the rats are there. Based on what the expert Trappers were telling me at the Rendezvous, I'm going to catch as many as I can before the slough freezes over. Some say that I might average $2 less per rat while others say that they never notice much of a difference at all. I'm trapping a large area with a healthy population of rats so there's no fear of trapping it out though. Good luck!