TOPIC: Maine - snow and fur

Classicfur,

Looks like you folks up there in Maine have some snow on the ground.

My nephew who lives just east of you (best I remember) sent me this picture showing what he has caught so far this season.

He started trapping last year and it looks like he's getting pretty good at it.

TNhunter

Wow! That's a good variety of Maine Furbearers.

He seems to have the knack for trapping.

For those that are not familiar with northern fur animals. Here's a list of whats in the photo.

A nice string of Pine Marten and Mink, Beaver, Raccoon, Red Fox, Coyote, Muskrat, Ermine, Bobcat and a couple of Very Large River Otter.

The only animal he does'nt have is Fisher.

Congrats to your nephew!

Thanks for sharing that photo.

classicfur

Classicfur,
That's pretty cool you can ID all those different animals from a pic. What are you a taxidermist? lol No really that is pretty cool.

TN,
Looks like your nephew knows his stuff too, nice string.

My brother-in-law and I used to trap back in the early 80's. Mostly Muskrat, Beaver, Mink, Fox and Raccoon.

How is the fur market these days? If I remember right we used to get $65 bucks for a red fox, and couple bucks a piece for Muskrat. Can't remember exactly on the raccoon and Beaver. I do know this thou. The Raccoon must have been pretty good because there wasn't a lot of road kill along the country roads. A lot of us country boys would pick up a fresh kill and skin it. Sounds sick but it was a quick $20 bucks per fur if I remember right.
Latt

Latt,

Not sure about the fur market up there but down here for TN fur it stinks.

I have not trapped in years - well because you just don't get enough for them to make it worth it anymore.

Now for northern fur the price is probably quite a bit better, but I don't know exactly what they run up there.

Back in the late 70's and 80's I was a big time trapper.

That's me on the right, and my trapping partner back then.

We caught 103 coons, 67 rats and a few other misc critters in 3 weekends that year - that was Dec 1987.

TNhunter

Guys,

Nice pics and comments all the way around.

Latt,

Nothing wrong with picking up a relatively undamaged road kill every now and then. I've done aplenty (mostly 'coon) over the years. My personal best was a mid-winter red fox back in around '79 or '80. I actually saw that one happen, and I scooped him up in a hurry! Fox prices were running high around that time.

Classicfur,

I sure do love them pine martin ... Of course there are none around here, (WV) but I've seen some nice ones on display at conventions, etc. We do have fisher. 25 of them were stocked here as a result of a trade for 25 wild turkeys with the state of New Hampshire. That was in 1969, and they were put in two of the more remote locations in WV. Since then they have done fairly well, and some have spread over into Maryland and PA. They were protected for years, but nowadays we can catch one a year. As you can imagine, the trapping regs. are pretty specific on that species.

TN,

Pretty nice haul there. With everything being \"in the round\", looks like a one night or two at the most, catch.

Bill

Bill,

In TN back then you could only trap coon in the month of December.

So we hit em hard while we could spending every weekend on the river that we could.

In 87 we got to trap the Duck River 3 weekends, but the last weekend the river was up and wild and was dropping back down fast so we could not set that weekend.

We would start out on Friday morning before daylight on the river making sets (on about a 14 mile stretch). We would bust our buts all day long and get out around 125 traps, and getting about the first 8 miles of river set good and getting off the river well after dark. Then the next morning hit it again just before daylight and run all of those sets, collect what we had, and reset what needed resetting, and we usually got that first 8 miles done around 1:00 or so, and we would set more traps from then until dark on down the river, again getting off the river well after dark.

At the end of the second day we had around 200 traps set.

Then the next morning we would run it again and collect all we caught and pull everything up and bring it home. We both had to go back to work on Monday.

So yes - that picture is made late Sunday evening when we got all of that pulled up and made it back home. We would sometimes have near 40 coons to skin after a 2 day like that. It would take us a few hours to get it all skinned and taken care of.

I could skin a coon in about 40-50 seconds back then. My partner was fast too so it did not take us all that long to get all of that fur taken care of.

In the early to mid 80's we got as high as 24.00 for a good color large coon, and usually got something like 5-6 bucks for a muskrat, 30-35 for a mink, 3-4 for a possum, 35-40 bucks for grey fox, 45 or so for a nice Red, 100-110 for bobcat.

Running the river like that was sure an adventure and a lot of work and fun for a young buck like me back then.

Made some good money too, bought most of my guns with Ginseng and Fur money.

TNhunter

I found the pictures from the other two weekends on the river that year.



Got a nice male mink, and a grey fox and nice bobcat as well as the usual collection of coon, mink, possum on this weekend trip.

TNhunter

And here is the last one from our 3 weekends on the river that year in 1987.

several coon, rats, one silver mink (otherwise known as possum) and a couple of small beaver.

Ahhhhh - those were the days !

TNhunter

TN,

Yep, I can see that you and your partner were running it hard, and I know the routine of which you speak.

Man O man, those December 'coon sure are nice!

Years ago, I had a partner, and we hit it in the same manner. We trapped the West Fork river in WV, and because of steep banks, we used a john boat. When it came to skinning, my partner would open 'em up, and I would pull 'em out. We got pretty handy with that method. We rolled up the green skins that needed fleshing, and put them in plastic bags, and into an old chest freezer. Then when we stopped trapping for awhile, we would get them out of the freezer, and flesh and stretch. 'Coon fat and beaver flesh scrapes nice that way.

Because of our day jobs, most of our trapping was on week-ends like yours was.

Most of our winter trapping was on land, and we took a lot of fox in the fur boom days. Then, later on, the coyotes came along, and we hit them too. The thing with the 'yotes was (as you probably know) that we had to cover far more territory, That worked out ok though, because in getting all those permissions, (which the land owners were only too glad to allow) I can now 'seng on a lot of properties here locally.

Sadly, my ol' partner is now deceased, and in the last few years, I have trapped sparingly. I'm not trapping at all now, but I am 'senging more, and as you know, just starting into the 'growing' venture.

Bill

PS: Most of my guns have come from fur money as well.

Pretty interesting thread here. Great pic's!