RK = Marathon Man

[17HMR]

Rich is the Marathon rat trapper, talked to him last night as he was finishing up. Wind howling, sleet blowing sideways and still trying to figure out how to get a few more as the seasons last hour draws near.
The mans got a lot of drive to stick with it that long!

[Rally Hess]

The rats are getting shaggy now anyway. I just got home yesterday myself. Roads and flooding are tough right now. As many closed roads as open where I was at.

[calvin]

I know he started a lot earlier (and stayed a lot longer) than most. He probably won't tell but I/d like to hear his year end rat totals. My hands and arms started to go numb after 2 weeks....and yes, the weather didn't exactly cooperate this year. I bet he/s plenty beat up by now. Yeah, he/s a tough bugger to play that game as long as he did. Not to mention the logistics of moving fur/carcasses and equipment.

[rk660]

real quick as plenty stuff to catch up on. 450 finished on hand sold Tues nite, right at 6.25 ave. only DMG not sold, and only around 35 graded damaged. caught I think around 18th to 23th. local skinner skinned @ .75 and furbuyer put up @.75, so had 1.50 in them, netted out 4.75 and I didnt touch besides haul carcasses. not bad when they havent paid 4.00 on carcass for 3 weeks. didnt see much change the last week. furbuyer I sold to will haul the damage to fha agent so dont even have to ship or handle. I still had around 80 rats grade clean, and getting 5.75 on slights all sizes and he is pushing to grade as many slights as he can for me. he was 1 and 3 on heavy/light damage, and thought sending them to sale best bet too as he dont want too terrible many dmg rats. the last weeks didnt seem much different looking than these, so expect close to same. at a certain point they stop fighting, but can see some shedding/thin ones. throw about 5-6 back in drink every day last 10 days that aint worth putting money into.

started around March 19th??, I think but seemed longer. lost about 5 days to come home for my folks goldent anniversery. lost prolly 3-4 more full days adding up 1/2 days here and there to vehicle problems, weather, selling fur, or chasing some gland sales. Not too many days under a 100, 5-6 maybe. had I think 5 days over 200, one day over 300. first 3 weeks south pretty easy to stay around 150 ave most days. up north same country I ran last year tougher to make 150 ave, usually just above a 100 to 130. lot less rats up there and prolly 3X the trappers. went into hill country after later ice out rats but 2x the driving for same # stops as in the flats where better numbers. Prolly should have stayed out of hills and just caught more in the flats, as the difference in damage wasnt that big. did a fair amount of experiementing that cost numbers but learned some good tricks for future.

Figured out pretty much best time/conditions for : 2 trap floats, bank sets, mini boards, colonies, and figured out the No 1 longest producing set bar none, thru early, mid and late spring season, and about my favorite set when it presents itself--the log set. Gained some new respect for longspring, 1 and 1 1/2 and where they actually can outshine a 1.5 coil at times. Got where I can set a no 1 long on a log, and do 99% catch/loss rate. hardly ever sprung, or lose the rat. simple quick ways to stabilize trap on log, and stablize log in wind. Had good luck moving logs to place of my choosing, and produce as good as a natural log. Had a 3" log, 4 -5 ft long, 4 no 1s on it, and NEVER had less than 3 rats per check, and many times checked 2x a day! park a float next to it and lucky 1 rat a day. Surprised how high out of water you can set a log and catch day after day if ya do it right (1 ft out of water no problem).

Figured out the little 1 trap board/pole, and when more effective than a float, and more versitile than a bank set. Lot of guys running them but just like a float, which works, but most guys are missing the setup that REALLY makes them shine I think.

To carrot or not, when it helps, when not needed. (anyone offering me carrot cake for next 6 months WILL risk a severe beating, LOL.)

Big thanks to couple guys: Matt Benndt and family, dont think he is on here. Absulutly one of the finest people Ive ever known. You too Nancy. Kim Potter-Potter Fur Co in Bridgewater. Damn good man. We became good friends, and worked out some good arraingments for the both of us. He has some heavy black plastic molded cones for funnel traps being made, which are FAR superior to the tin cones on most funnel traps, and highly recomend them. And Rick, my Native American skinner up north-peace brother!

Best laugh: Seeing Dusty H's trainwreck on side of slew. bits of foam scattered over 100 sq. yards, boards sticking up up in air out of water busted to bits, poles bent and broken, small crop circle in cattails shredded into pieces.......I looked at this disaster from the hyway, scratching my head: WTF happened here? Then I saw the drowned coon in the middle of it all......LOL. Dusty dumps his boards in 2 at a time, 4 ft apart usually, so he got "double the fun, double the pleasure" "Hey Dusty, bring me back a gallon of coon lure tommorow when ya leave your shop, got a GOOD idea for all them compitition's boards set too close to comfort next to me!"

Carved in stone, quote of the season : SET YOUR OWN GOTDAM ICEHOLE!

[trappincoyotes39]

rich did you have much theft issues?

[blackhammer]

Good job Rich!I sure agree with more rats in the south.That northeast didn't have the super numbers of last year.Unless your talking numbers of trappers.After a tough winter I was looking foward to some nice spring days rat trapping but it was mostly like late November.But all in all it sure is a fun way to try and make a buck.I believe someone offers me carrots right now my reaction would be similar to yours.lol Put all our eggs in the platform sets that killed last year cost us rats.They were disappointing percentage wise.The colonies were good as usual just a little work finding tubes that weren't plugged.Should have made a bunch of floats but it would have been a one year deal for us Minnesota game hogs.LOLMight go back one last time next winter house trapping.Bet I easily saw fifteen or so mink running around out there,Unbelievable amount of mink.It would be tough trapping them as far as keeping rats from plugging traps and your mink aren't funneled down location wise.
Ran into a number of friends out there along with making a friend or two .Which is sure different than most trapping I do and that was kind of neat.

[thorsmightyhammer]

To carrot or not, when it helps, when not needed. (anyone offering me carrot cake for next 6 months WILL risk a severe beating, LOL.)

Do you suppose there are some stores in SD that were scratching their head thinking "geeze people must really be eating carrots" and than ordered extra and wont sell them for six months?

Thats a pretty good price for spring rats when its cash in hand. I think the earlier hype of the rat market is living up.

[rk660]

Not really Randy, a float and trap here, and one there. Prolly less than 20 traps total. Between Roslyn and Peirpoint I had 3-4 stops in a row ripped, then over. Layed low and pulled obvious stuff a few days expecting more, but nothing else happened. Guess there was a fair amount of theft in Rosyln area. One guy had 15 or so traps/floats shotgunned around there he told me. Some guys said they got hit hard 20-30 floats in a row. Around Clark I think. When I was working out of Madison, my next push north was gonna be bottom end of Lake Thomson/Arlington/De Smet area. The game warden that was doing some skinning for me HIGHLY ADVISED me to stay clear of that area, as all kinds of theft and games going on. Guys pissed off so bad they where packing heat and seeing red. Couple -3 locals he told me, all in a big pissing match with each other. Kinda a yearly thing in that area he elluded. Chain reaction theft deal sounds like. I did drive thru a bunch of the bottom end of Thomson debating on setting, as looked darn good and really not a huge amount of floats I thought, but everyone was hiding their gear pretty heavy behind the reeds, and grassing in their floats, almost to the extreme I thought. So much it kinda spooked me a little. Couple hard looks from a pair of guys in a truck that looked like trappers too when I was out of my truck kinda looking things over.

Kinda wonder if 1/2 this spring theft results from guys being a little too close to each other, floats 5-10 ft away from next guy. One guy see his traps on top of board 3 days in a row, while the guy right next to him is catching, and figures this guy HAS to to be stealing his rats for him not to catch. Or somebody finally blows a gasket when the compitition dumps in each side of him 10 ft away 5 stops in a row. Guys get to using a shoe horn to squeeze there way in at times it seems.
About every time I see 20 boards from 8 different trappers piled in 10 ft from each other on a 50 yard pisshole slew, 9 times outta 10 you can drive mile or 2 and find a good 1/4 miler w/o a single board on it!
Come to think float trappers and walleye fisherman about the same. 2 walleye boats park next to each other not catching a thing, and hr later 15 more boats gathered around not catching a thing. One boat by itself 1/4 mile away catching like crazy. Same with floats, get 3 floats in a ditch, tommorow there will be 15 more boards scatttered on same same ditch! LOL.
(ROTFLMAO when its the same ditch Ive been for a week, dragging 8-10 rats day off the colonies in culverts, when it slide to 1-2, and moving them to greener pastures, here come the boards, LOL)

Donnie F. in Webster told me had a lot of rats stolen off his boards, and how he found out the guy next to him was baiting w/ carrots, and one day carrots showed up on couple of his boards right next to guy. Musta figured he could steal more with bait. Think there was a fair amount of that going on at times. Like the guy that runs only10 boards and catches a 100 rats every day, but only sets when at least 5 other boards close together. He just gets up earlyer than everyone else I spose, LOL. It does seem most board theives are kind enough to reset your traps, LOL. (Not that its really funny, but ya gotta laugh some of this stuff off, or youd drive yourself nuts worrying about it)

I had a nice little spur line6-8 miles long, doublelane hiway, nice mowed shallow banks w/ short grass in water, concreate shoulder parking, 3 steps to water, ankle deep with firm bottoms. Ya know, a little sweetheart gravy run. So another sets up, and sets in about 20 yards away from me at every stop. And sets all the best ones cause he can see both traps down where Im catching best. (usually doubled up floats at best stops). Hell, I do the same at times, judge how good a slew or area by others guys boards and catches. Didnt horn right in on top of me, but just set where I was catching, and so would he. I figured beings your using me for locations and cant set a single one of his own, Im gonna damn sure have more gear in than him, so I'd dump 2 more 20 yards other side of him. Then the game of one-upmanship starts. He dumps more boards in to be equal/more numbers of boards to me. Next thing there more boards than rats, LOL. I did pull a good one. He missed a real good slew I had set first time. One end I didnt catch squat for 2 days, so I moved to other end of slew and some reason caught like crazy. So I pulled my hi-viz boards out and dumped a bunch of mini boards and bank sets w/ T bars that couldnt be seen w/o poking around. Took 3 boards and 6 nuts rats and threw them out obvious to a one eyed glaucoma patient in open water on the dead side! Sucked him right in and he set up the dead side, 10 yards from my rigged spread, and he never set the good side. Hell, I even added fresh carrots a time or two to the boards to make it look good, kick and spin a board or 2 to make look different every day. LOL, never saw but one trap down off the 3 boards he dumped in!

I always wanted to run into the guy at that stop, and tell him about this superduper lure Im using, why Im catching and he aint, and sell him some coon lure, LOL.

[thorsmightyhammer]

Them dam MN guys are kinda thick aint hey lol.

I heard the guys got cleaned pretty good one morning on hwy 25 south and webster and north of clark.

Theft aint so bad if they are nice enough to leave the traps and even reset them. Maybe a guy can catch one in between.

How about that dude who was snapping traps. Some people have some balls ha.

[rk660]

Blackhammer, think the fall/early winter pressure was real heavy in that area was part of reason. There was some really good stuff here/there, and some just dead dead dead. You guys must not of stayed too long up there, week or less maybe? If you was running north of where you stayed, and south to next town, I can see why ya cut it short. farther south was much better overall. I set up a loop on hiway between those towns with pretty much just colonies like 3 days before ending date, dont think I caught a rat a mile, maybe only rat every 2-3 miles, dead, dead dead. Only spot worth stopping was right in town you guys ran out of. Remember that little cattail ditch right in/next to town? Right next to the grain elevator? Had 4 rats in that culvert. Kenny stuck it out a while I saw. You wouldnt have his number would ya. Never got a chance to talk to him much just in passing on the road. Now west 12 miles from there, and then back north thru a bunch of them bare lakes was pretty fair, but got to be too many miles between stops to really pile up the numbers. too much driving-not enough stops. Where all you guys running them "mini" boards? I picked up a pile of them laying around. Was gonna buy some 1x6 to make a few more, then one windy day, 50 mph radio said, blowing into rocks on those big lakes between webster and waubay, all the free wood youd ever need was washed up on the shores. Shoulda saw the pile of trees, driftwood, lumber and whatnot blown on top of the Lake Waubay road after 50 mph winds. Then next morning I had to stop 1/2 doz times to move logs, and BIG logs washed on top of road. They had 2 front end loaders and 4 dump trucks then next day to clean off the road. Down by Waubay, there was 4 ft tall piles of reeds on the road in places. Never found some floats that got washed into those huge piles.

[rk660]

Kinda in response to HMR's title to post, I think there was fair amount of other guys that went 5-6 weeks too. Physically, its about the easyest trapping there is really, and what saved me was not skinning. Skinning every night would have wore a guy down for that long, so i decidedto get most/all of it farmed out from begining. Cut deal with furbuyer to sell part carcass and part he put up for me alternating days, and then had a skinner up north. Prolly sold 40% on carcass, got some finished to auctions, some sold furbuyers put up as I was getting my put up stuff back as finished about once a week. I had days off, or 1/2 days off, weather and vehicle or logistics based here and there. Once I even said hell with it and slept in till noon. I ran some 18 hr days, and some 8 hr days. 10-12-14 on line prolly ave, with a good 1/2 hr or even 1 hr stop lunch and/or supper. That helps. Drove a few roads just to see what over hill at times too. I worked hard when I had to, and paced myself and slowed down when I needed to. No superman endurence 110% start to end by any means. Id never had made it. Treid enough new things to keep interestiing and new.

As far as catches, I never set any records by any means. Not sure exact numbers as sold 3 different places, and I dont write numbers down every day at end of day either. Usually would drop rats middle of day, and sometimes end of day. Like drop 180 on a day plus next morning, then drop 80 on 3/4 days worth. End of day more worried about getting gloves and boots dried and or patched, get lights on charger, get dry extra cloths/socks loaded, load the damn carrots so i dont forget when 1/2 asleep next morning. by the time all those little chores done, about all the counting Im worried about is, is there at least 3-4 cold beers in fridge to relax too till dream time.....


I did count up to where I know I went over 4000 but not by much. Other guys did better than me in even less time. If you divide # days gone total, by catch total, my daily ave wasnt even that impressive really. if your out there for a week-10 days and doing 150/day, your usually at say 1500 in 10 days many times. but go weeks compared to days/1 week duration, your daily ave will slip, even when seems youve been on 150/day stretch most of week. Your pull days, reset days. if ya pull 1/2 the line and traps on truck that night, then your got a 50-80-100 day here/ there. run 1/3 of day to pick up/sell fur or whatever, and run only 2/3 rd to 3/4 of traps that day, so that 150 drops to 100 or whatever, it all drags the daily ave down over a longer haul. Its damn hard to have 200 or whatever top notch sets out for a month, without losing a % of sets in the field, or 100% checked, each and everyday, day after day for 6 weeks or so. Always something here/there that will push your daily ave down over a longer duration of time. Throw in a few 40-60 days when iced out, start early enough and you'll have some for sure too. Hit a few dead areas that need pulled and reset will dimishs daily numbers here and there too.
Overall, was satisfied with the number caught, but know what cost 500-1000, maybe more, in hindsite too. Some weeks was disappointed with myself, some weeks pretty pleased.

One thing that was important, was extending the season from a $$$ standpoint for me. Most carcass rat buying at $4 was done by April 15??? I think. Most carcass selllers quit when it drops below $4, and rightly so if going that route. Figured $4 was make/break number that I had to have. by lining up skinners, having a plan and means to get put up quickly, and reviewed and or sold, I knew about what I was working with, and knew it was profitable. KNOWING just that, made it much easyer to stay out longer, than guessing if you were still in the money. Without knowing, it would have been much harder to stick it out.

[calvin]

I had a lot of re-set traps as well...but they set them on the coon notch. Kept yelling to myself "At least reset them so I can catch a rat".

Yep, almost like the fishing junk... pull a fish into your boat and within minutes you have a dozen bobbers hitting the side of your boat from all angles because you must have the hot spot. Trappers no different, there. Had a guy following me everywhere. Anywhere I set a float he did, too...within arms reach but never figured out why I was catching and he wasn't. It got old but kind of fun to pimp him abit as he was going out of his mind playing games...that didn't produce.

Yep, a few of the locals (and not so locals) mad, mad , mad. I had a few floats shot up as well. I suspect it will get a lot worse next year. MN will be out of the game but for every MN guy there this year there will be 2 to fill his shoes next year, I suspect. Saw guys riding along scouting for next year already. I don't know that I would want to be a part of it if it got much worse....and I think it will.

[blackhammer]

Good stuff RK,stayed about a week up north.In hind site should have stayed south longer even if there would have been a little more damage.Caught a couple rats one day right by were we stayed in that ditch.Some knucklehead drove over my colony trap with a three wheeler with rats in it so I pulled.In hind site should done a lot of things different.would have definitely used full size floats to a large degree.Your log deal doesn't surprise .Did that a few times and always caught rats.But was to dumb to realize it wasn't a fluke I guess.lolBut hind site is always 20-20.Unfortunately won't be able to use all the things I learned this spring into improving for next spring. dam!I'll pm you Kenny's number when I get the chance.

[claytoncarr]

Good for you Rich!!!!!!!!!!!!

[kelly]

RK; That is absolutely the best quote I've heard in a long time.

May 8, 2011 11:36:37 GMT -6 calvin said:

I had a lot of re-set traps as well...but they set them on the coon notch. Kept yelling to myself "At least reset them so I can catch a rat".

Yep, almost like the fishing junk... pull a fish into your boat and within minutes you have a dozen bobbers hitting the side of your boat from all angles because you must have the hot spot. Trappers no different, there. Had a guy following me everywhere. Anywhere I set a float he did, too...within arms reach but never figured out why I was catching and he wasn't. It got old but kind of fun to pimp him abit as he was going out of his mind playing games...that didn't produce.

Yep, a few of the locals (and not so locals) mad, mad , mad. I had a few floats shot up as well. I suspect it will get a lot worse next year. MN will be out of the game but for every MN guy there this year there will be 2 to fill his shoes next year, I suspect. Saw guys riding along scouting for next year already. I don't know that I would want to be a part of it if it got much worse....and I think it will.

Calvin; Yep am glad he was following you instead of me! Wonder what happened when he had to find locations on his own after the "move".

Sure would have been nice to set up some of the good stuff but I didn't want to infringe on others who were there first so I did a lot of driving the fringes finding places to myself, and I did! Sure made for a good line albeit longer because sets/locations were much farther apart in these fringe areas. Probably could have caught more rats myself by pulling/moving but figured all the down time/loss of catch would have been too much.

Had theft problems in two areas, one of which was on Hwy 25, too and I stayed away from this area when there were floats everywhere-after they pulled late in the season then I moved in and caught rats but did have 4 floats on one slough stolen one day. The other place was a problem from the get go till I finally had enough and pulled out. First a float disappeared, then my traps were set back on the floats not like I put them and with the pans real high, then the traps were always down, sprung and empty. This area of about 5 square miles and about 12-15 floats was at end of line and a dead end run so one day decided to run them in the morning-guess what then almost all my traps were full of rats so I knew someone was helping themselves to my rats. Finally I pulled them and the others in this area-next year I won't even set it up-figure I should have had another 100-120 rats here.

This being my first trip to SD was definitely a learning experience but a successful one. Next year will know what to do from the getgo and should be able to catch the same number as this year in half the time. My best day was 170 from 90 floats, a few bank sets and even fewer colonies. Sold the first two batches of rats in the carcass. Brought the last batch(750+) home and they are now done and ready to sell. Now just have to figure out where?

[kelly]

May 8, 2011 10:03:05 GMT -6 thorsmightyhammer said:

Them dam MN guys are kinda thick aint hey lol.

I heard the guys got cleaned pretty good one morning on hwy 25 south and webster and north of clark.

Theft aint so bad if they are nice enough to leave the traps and even reset them. Maybe a guy can catch one in between.

How about that dude who was snapping traps. Some people have some balls ha.

Had snapped traps from time to time and different floats-then started finding some rocks on my floats and figured out what was going on. I am kind of niave when it comes to this sort of thing as my mind nevers has worked that way-to steel or mess with other trappers stuff. With the amount of rats up there can't understand why this even happens but then I guess there are a lot of jealous people and lazy ones too who would rather someone else does the work and they steel the spoils!

[thorsmightyhammer]

Paul, pack up and move.

You could be a resident in 60 to 90 days.

Rich I boxed up the rats joe caught that last week by you. They are mostly bit but not too bad. It will be interesting to see what they bring. They are going speedee in the am.

Kelly I enjoyed you sharing with us your trip. Good luck on the rats.

[rk660]

Kelly talk to Marvin Krause over there in IA. been doing me real well. Did we meet? where you part of the father/son team from IA I met in watertown?

Anybody know who was running the floats with 110 on them? I never saw a trap down. wondered if they had much luck? they had a pile of them, bet I saw 50. Maybe they did better, but from what I saw I'd guess they were doing less than 10% in them. That would be kinda a kick in the gonads, to build 50-75-100 rigs that didnt catch wouldnt it? curious how they did.

[blackhammer]

They were some Minnesota guys Rich.They caught a few in them.But said they realized it was costing them big time and were converting over to floats with leg holds.Talk to a local that was experimenting with a floating colony trap.He said finally he had one with I believe three rats down the hole.But it sounded like it wasn't working very well.
Rich you hunting morals down there?They are coming slow up here.Think this week especially with some rain.

[kelly]

May 9, 2011 0:13:32 GMT -6 rk660 said:

Kelly talk to Marvin Krause over there in IA. been doing me real well. Did we meet? where you part of the father/son team from IA I met in watertown?

Anybody know who was running the floats with 110 on them? I never saw a trap down. wondered if they had much luck? they had a pile of them, bet I saw 50. Maybe they did better, but from what I saw I'd guess they were doing less than 10% in them. That would be kinda a kick in the gonads, to build 50-75-100 rigs that didnt catch wouldnt it? curious how they did.

Rich;

We have talked at conventions but did not meet in SD and don't know who the father/son team from Iowa was. I solo'd and hung out more in the middle and on the fringes of the rat country. Will introduce myself next time I see you!

I do not know Marvin Krause but then have only lived in Iowa since 2006. Do you have a phone number you could send me?

Went through my rats last night and there is a lot of slights-most every rat has at least one bite-guess this last batch that I brought home ended up being much worse than I figured as far as bite marks but the size is huge-most all are over 15". Oh well, even at $4-4.50 ave it will still be a good check and this one is all profit. Expenses including new freezer and cargo trailer were paid from first two checks with some leftover.