Thinking like the animal you want to trap-snare!
In this fast pace world people
forget to slow down stop and think. It
is easy to get caught up in the rush of life and expect the world to be
the same. When you step off into the woods you must first learn to slow
down. You must learn to look and notice details. But you must also
think like the animal you are after.For instance a rabbit most people think of as survival food. Rabbits are the other white meat and quite tasty. Well worth learning how to trap/snare. Now you have a good tasting target. How in the world do you think like a rabbit? All animals need the same survival requirements that we need. Food, water, shelter and mates. Rabbits breed I know big surprise it is not uncommon for 3 batches of little ones to be born in a single year. 4-6 new rabbits each time. Just on paper you are now looking at say on average 15 new rabbits per mating pair per year. Wow awesome right?
But this is where you must start thinking like a rabbit what are their predators? Hawks, owls, feral cats, weasels, mink, fox and coyotes. By the time the hunting season rolls around you will have 30-50% new rabbits left to harvest. Predators are not perfect and make mistakes missing the prey animal. The prey animal then learns to protect itself better. This is where you understanding the need for shelter can be used to your advantage.
110 conibear quickly kills the rabbit
Notice the first 2 predators I listed was hawks and owls? There is a reason for that because they take a lot of rabbits. The rabbits learn to stay out of open spaces. They learn to use cover and to hide in something with an overhead. Build boxes out of scrap wood 6x6-24 if you are in the north with the larger snowshoe hare 8x8. Place the boxes out ahead of time. The rabbits well start using them. Simply place a 110 on both ends of the box or a snare and you are in business. What else can you use old culvert pipes, heck you can even use pipes up to 2 feet round just narrow the entrance with brush down to 5-6 inches. If you want you can feed them a little corn now and then.
Modern snare works like a champ.
Now if you are paying attention I also just you gave a big tip for set location. Culverts dry and wet are used by animals all the time. But you have variety of animals using them. Say you set a rabbit snare in front of a culvert and come back to a torn up snare with no catch you just ran in to a raccoon.
Rabbits also live most of their lives in a 1 sq mile. They have hundreds of trails in that sq mile. Which trail will they use every night? That one take practice and knowledge to figure out. In fact you could spend a life time studying them and still not be right every time. That is why I say trap-snares are percentage game. The more you have out the better chances you have of success.
Even with all my knowledge I still can't be 100% I figure 4 snares per 1 catch. But when you are just starting out it may take you 12 snares per one catch. There is a learning curve to this. Some folks buy some snares and put them out thinking I can figure it out. Most end up disappointed because they fully did not understand how to set the snare properly. A few tips and tricks they missed cost them no animals.
But you need to understand how a modern professional grade snare works. They are awesome survival tool because they are light weight easy to carry and can be connected to a tree for a field anchor. That is why I highly recommend carrying them.
Emergency snare kit
First a small fanny pack, basic instructions, support wire to hold the snare at the correct height off the ground, 2 emergency only deer/hog snares, 6 medium snares used for raccoons, possum beaver coyotes fox, 6 small game snares used for taking rabbits, squirrels, marmots ground hogs.
The modern snare is an awesome tool the parts are the swivels this allows the snare to swivel and not bind up, a washer to keep the swivel from tearing up the stop button kind of like a bearing, then a support collar you hook the support wire to this keep the snare set at the correct height off the ground and a self locking snare lock. Self locking this is the cool part the snare lock are designed to only close once they hit the animal they lock and will not re open until you arrive. Two different type of locks are used one is a relaxing lock designed to back off a little and the animal is just restraining like a choke collar on a dog, the other is a kill style to quickly put the animal down.
Of course setting these you must be careful not to catch dogs. The relaxing lock on a dog that has never been placed on a leash may fight it until he dies. Most of the time the dog just sits down waiting for you to let him go. But that is another article all together on dogs letting them go and dogs if the world comes to an end. It is up to you take responsibility for your own action - you set the snare don't blame me if you catch a dog. :-)
I taught a survival class in Vermont a few years ago. With only 10 minutes of instruction on how to set a snare a young man left and caught the ground hog that was tearing up his garden the first night. We BBQ the ground hog over a open fire and was surprising tasty. :-) You see protecting your garden from critters is a must in true survival.
I hope this gives you an idea on snaring. Please feel free to email me at prohuman@daktel.com
Buckshot-Bruce
*20 August, 2009 is the date that Buckshot's Articles were migrated from the Trapping Section to his own sub domain on RuralSurvivial.info
