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Post by trappnman on Jan 3, 2006 7:33:23 GMT -6
having seen many otter trails in the snow- and seeing the width of them- add in the number of rats I've taken in 330s-
my personal opinion is the side trigger mount, other modifications are a feel good regulation that doesn't mean diddly squat.
I think the number of otters it saves can be counted on one hand.
Comments?
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Post by ColdSteel on Jan 3, 2006 8:14:32 GMT -6
Tman I agree with you 100%.I do right much otter trapping and that is a bunch of bull.A big male otter can reach 30 plus pounds and be 7 to 8 inches wide easy and a 330 is 10 inches so any otter that passes through a 330 is a lucky bastard.I don't care how much you slide a trigger.The only way you can avoid otter in a 330 is to leave them in the truck
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Post by thefoxtrapper on Jan 3, 2006 8:22:44 GMT -6
yep, you will miss muskrats doing that, but you wont miss many otter, maybe some real small ones that get super lucky, but I catch a lot of huge otter and they just about fill the trap side to side, maybe its one of them rules to appease the public?
winston
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Post by Bogmaster on Jan 3, 2006 10:04:05 GMT -6
Kind of like deer stops. Tom Olson
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Post by Deleted on Jan 3, 2006 11:04:11 GMT -6
I agree,the regulation means diddly squat. ::)I have to abide by it , and while I admit to being only a casual beaver trapper and have never trapped otter, I know it will not prevent incidental otter catches. I caught muskrats in my modified 330's during my short (only two weeks long in this part of NY) beaver season last week. The kicker is that you can use 280's and 220's still for beaver in the regulation zones. Alot of trappers are using those sizes in protest and to avoid modifying their 330's. This is just setting us up for total elimination of the other traps, and there will be incidental otter catches in those. The regulation was passed to apease the big money groups and corporations that funded the otter restoration program in the parts of the state that are affected by the regulation. Between otter and fisher restoration efforts the NY trapper may lose the use of all conibears bigger than 110 size on land and water. Game management is controled by money in NY and manipulated by emotion . The otter restoration is a cash cow for our DEC and the otter is the perfect "cute" animal to generate sympathy in achieving these goals with the non-trapping public here.
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Post by briankroberts on Jan 3, 2006 12:50:51 GMT -6
Here in central IL we have Otter in large numbers on a couple of Drainages I trap, otter were released on the drainages, some 15 odd years ago. Now its gotten to the point , that even with trying to avoid them I catch 1 otter to about every 10 Beaver, heck there everywhere and There's lots of good beaver locations I didn't even set because of the amount of Otter sign. The DNR got them off the Threatened and Endangered Specices list 2 years ago( Bobcats 5 years ago) still we have a season On Neither, I was told by the head of the DNR that they were waiting on the IL Trappers Assoc, to find some Representivie that would sponser Legislation for a season, as the DNR only got 1 or 2 pieces of Legs a year and Otter and Cats weren't top priority. Well through the hard work of our Officers in the ITA it was introduced this year, once it got to the house of Reps, it was sent to excutive comitte and has since been there. So much for otter and cats, by the way a lot of the Money to stock the Otters and radio collar the cats came from the Furbearer stamp, that we had to buy to harvest furbearers.....B.....
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Post by musher on Jan 3, 2006 13:00:49 GMT -6
After reading what Bobber wrote, I think that the trigger mod is brilliant. I also think it will eliminate the vast majority of incidental otter catches. The guys that developed the modification should be profoundly thanked for saving the 330 and thereby saving the state lots of money in having to pay for nuisance beaver removal.
There are no smilies in "quick reply" so you'll have to guess my tone.
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Post by titan69 on Jan 3, 2006 15:04:12 GMT -6
This is a subject that has been going on for a long time. I personally do not agree with it. I do not see how this will save many otters (my opinion only). I posted a picture of that 66 pound beaver I caught & you can see the trigger mod's in that picture. Brandon made a great post under & he's right on the money. I see smaller beaver's getting hip caught & the trap not doing it's job. In short, I see this as a danger to using our 330's.
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Post by thefoxtrapper on Jan 3, 2006 15:47:14 GMT -6
you all will probably not like to hear this but if NY wants to protect otter in certain areas then hanging up the conibear trap will be the only real effective way, but then the beaver trapping goes out the window, I wouldnt leave my house if i couldnt use 330s, w
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Post by jsevering on Jan 3, 2006 17:09:58 GMT -6
what comes with that trigger regulation, if you happened to lose your traditional otter wmu's, so they can filter out into other areas is the real buster, no trap within 15 feet of the dam.
if your going to try and blind set the shine in back of the feed bed, better be dam sure it isnt holding fish.
abundance of otter sign and cant set the flows with any type of decent blind set or you know your gonna have a dead one. hate trapping when you have to go to extremes on avoiding pull outs, cross overs and channel sets to such a degree or become the next poster child for the dec.
I feel like a school boy rat trapper, standing on the bank with a dozen traps, apple and knife in hand looking at a pond full of ducks.....jim
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Post by Itrapny on Jan 3, 2006 18:08:40 GMT -6
This has been a hotly contested issue in New York for quite some time now. Bobber hit right on the head when he said that it all boiled down to $$. The otter restoration project for Central & Western NY was funded by several big corporations with money, most notably, Xerox and Kodak. If you take a look at the data that was collected, if you can find any, you will probably see (Can't say for sure, no one seems to be able to produce it) that the otter mortality rate was well below the expected 10%. That along with natural reproduction and otters moving back into habitat by themselves, the real reason the 330 regulation came about was to appease corporate assholes. Now I must say, I thought the the NYSTA had pretty much folded on us trappers here in NY, but through discussions with many trappers in NY throughout the past year, I can say that we could be worse off. The NYSTA and JTI Committee worked hard to actually get the final product even if it does still suck for many trappers. The part the really bites trappers like jsevering in the ass is the otters for the restoration project were live trapped from his WMU's which are now closed to otter trapping, GO FIGURE? ? Anyway, the state DEC is supposed to reevaluate this trigger crap 2 years from now, if you are a trapper in NY please think about becoming a vocal member in a local and/or state trappers association so we can get this reversed or relaxed. I'm off my soapbox now.....
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Post by Rick on Jan 3, 2006 18:48:06 GMT -6
The trigger reg sucks. Zero otter sign here in my piece of Western N.Y......none. If I did see otter sign or had reason to believe an otter may travel through a stretch of water.....I could use my own best judgement to avoid catching it.
The short two week season, along with the terrible weather normally associated with those two weeks, should be enough in itself to spare the otters much damage.
So why can't I set a trap...ANY TRAP.....within 15ft. of a beaver dam or lodge, active or abandoned? I was chastised once for posting a paragraph very similar to this, but....WTF? When is that abandoned beaver lodge no longer a beaver lodge and just a pile of sticks?
And if a mink bores a 2 inch hole in this pile of sticks.......and I put a 110 conibear over it......what'll happen? One of the imaginary otter might come out of there? And I'll kill him? Yeah, right.......and I'll eat 'im whole. Gimme a break.
Rick.
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Post by Zagman on Jan 4, 2006 5:47:36 GMT -6
I was at a furbuyers last night and he was pointing out the other downside of this regulation.....the suitcase affect and the mark it leaves on the leather.....
He also was skinning a muskrat that got caught in a modified 330.....heck, if a muskrat cant get through......
My biggest beef, and that of many others, was that we took a killer trap and made it into a gripping/holding/drowning trap.
He showed me some beaver pelts from up north, where these regulations do not apply, and the bulk of them had the coniber mark on the leather just behind the ears....
The way it should be....
Zagman
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Post by jsevering on Jan 4, 2006 6:44:47 GMT -6
Mark, sad point is the dec dosnt care, argued those exact points with gordon and scott at the convention, scott didnt say much, but gordon kept saying how afixiaton was humane, asked him if he wanted drowner slides to go with the 330 reg. being a smart ass,he still didnt get it.
explained the value of clear back beavers and wanting to have the dog hit them in the stomack or bottom side, didnt get anywhere down that road either.
asked what kind of bmp bs. this crap was and the answer you get is, it is not a bmp!!!!
so if it isnt better management, what the hell is it?.........jim
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Post by thefoxtrapper on Jan 4, 2006 7:11:49 GMT -6
i wouldnt like that reg either and wouldnt support it here due to poor catches on small animals especially small beaver and otter, but I will tell you it bothers me absolutely zero to leg trap a beaver and run him down a slide and drown him.....basically what I mean is I dont use 330s because they kill quicker, I use them because they make my trapping easier and less chance of a loss, cause once hes in it, he will drown quick if not killed, winston
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Post by trappnman on Jan 4, 2006 7:33:23 GMT -6
I don't think that was the point winston. I think jim meant that the ADVANTAGE of a 330 is that it is going to be a killing trap, and the regulations have in effect changed that function.
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Post by jsevering on Jan 4, 2006 7:38:50 GMT -6
I dont mind using a flat trap and slider either, what bothers me is a live hip caught beaver on top of a channel, in the shallow, eliminates places where conibears shine to there full potental..........jim
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Post by thefoxtrapper on Jan 4, 2006 9:00:11 GMT -6
i agree it is bad business and handicaps the trap from the start, the best way to get rid of the reg is document how many otter you are still catching with the mod, the DEC tags them I would imagine so they have numbers from previous years, so if close to the same catch anyways, you could prove it is useless and actually causes poor catches and fur damage, but then you may get a shorter season or no season in areas, so dont really know what the best road is for you guys, winston
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Post by z on Jan 4, 2006 9:04:44 GMT -6
The best road is to let the Beavers flood the roads, schoolgrounds etc. In other words, DO NOT set any beaver traps. Target rats, More bang for the buck. LOL! You want the beaver dead, You WILL pay me or you can swim......Your call! All I have to say about that......
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Post by thefoxtrapper on Jan 4, 2006 10:05:35 GMT -6
good idea z, but bet it wont work as not every trapper will hang their traps, too many guys will catch them at a loss financially, w
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