[KegRiver]

Originally Posted by Mr Flyguy

Well said.

I agree that the whole forum has a great bunch of participants and enthusiasts in their particular interests, so like that guy in the Sun newspaper says: "I'm just going shut my big yap!"

Why do we trap? Why do you fish?

For each participant the answer is different. For some it is economic activity, when your options are working at McRauchies or washing windows at the local Tru Value, trapping can look like a decent alternative.

For some it's a way of life, being part of nature. Yes we are part of nature, we live and breeth, we eat and poop, we make babies, just like they do.
Nature utilizes the resources around it, even other creatures, just as trappers do. And we see animals living free and mostly uninfluenced by man. Not caged and hand fed.

Part of it is about being independent, reward proportional to effort, limitless opportunity for innovation, not having to share the income with those who did nothing to assist, contribute or share what they have.

For others it's simply a challenge. Working to succeed at something one has never done before.

For a few it's about living a fantasy. Being a "Mountain man" Rough, tough and fearless.

For me, and I suspect for most who trapped full time, it's about all of those things and more.
I love learning, I love wildlife, I love life. I grew up in a trapping household.
My dad trapped, my brothers trapped, my neighbors trapped and my friends trapped. It was something we had in common. Something to share, something to talk about.
It was what I knew and what I could do well.


I like being independent, I like being innovative, I like being one with nature, getting back to my roots. I like the solitude, I like the freedom, I like being able to work as long as I like, when I like, how I like.

There is no simple answer as to why we trap. But I think that at the root of it all, one would find that most trappers have learned to dislike the hustle and bustle of the working for wages life.
I think most of us hate working for a corporation that could care less if we live or die, we hate being a number on a data sheet. We hate having every moment of our working days regulated for company profit.
We hate the politics of the work environment, we hate the back stabbing, idea steeling, ladder climbers every work environment attracts.

We hate the faceless companies that take you ideas and claim them as their own, that want you to be available 24/7 but only want to pay you four hours a day four days a week. We hate the fact that to live in that world we have to live by the clock, we have to put friends and family in second place behind someones profit margin.

It's not really about trapping or killing. We would be just as happy panning for Gold, if there were any to pan, or logging, if we could do it by ourselves without all the licenses, replanting plans, cleanup requirements and regulations.
We would be just as happy fishing for a living, if it offered the same freedom and income.

We would even be just as happy photographing the wildlife instead of trapping it, if we had that gift. Or painting it, or researching it.

But much of life these days wants to regulate us to death, demands half a life of paper learning before one is allowed to enter that world, or demands, yes demands we sign our lives over to the company.

Trapping is one of the last things we can do where we can be true to who we are.

Part of nature. Not an automaton or a fad purchasing robot that the modern world favors.

Trapping is an adventure, it's exploration, it's challenges ones limits, it forces one to fight through tough times and accept the rough days.

In exchange we learn and we grow, and we gain the satisfaction of knowing we did it on our own, we can survive, we can make it through.

We are tappers and proud of it.