mountain men had a hard life

I have a friend here in Nampa has run a trap line for the last couple of years. Having grown up in the woods chaising all kinds of little critters I thought this would be a lot of fun, something that I have always wanted to try. Well let me tell you it is a lot of work to run a trap line.

I started trapping around Nov. My friend Ben took me out, showed me how to set traps for different kinds of animals and how to identify where the animals were traveling. From there things just kind of took off as they do when I am intrested in something. I bought 25 traps of different kinds and started setting my own lines. I had a lot of failers at first but caught enought of the dummer animals out there to keep me going. ( I just cull the weak, poor sick and dumb from the animal kingdom) I tried to trap land animals but for reasons most likly related to my skill never did catch anything other then wild house cats and someones pet dog.

I did get very good (just as the season ended) at trapping water animals. My list of sucesses are beaver, muskrat, mink, raccoon, skunk (is that a sucess or a failer?) and one road kill coyotie. After it was all said and done I ended up with 57 furs at the end of the year. I saved the largest beaver (measured 75 inches, you take the measurement from top to bottom and side to side after it is stretched and add them together.) that means this beaver was and XXXL one. I took everything to a fur sale in eastern Idaho and made just enough money to cover the cost of fuel for the season.

What I learned. It takes all lot of time to run a trap line. I would have about 4 hours to walk the line (about 1 mile down river and then back up) and if I caught anything it could take up to 2 hours at home to preper the fur. I ruined 2 sets of waders and got plenty cold and wet. Went hungry sometimes and smelled like a skunk a time or two also. I even made beave tail soup for the family one night. Everyone ate it and some even liked it.