Made you look!

I'm on break from school and been having some luck trapping the old farm buildings.




Happy New Years!!

what are you getting $$ for a prime
ringtailed mini bear?

$15 to $20 each. Its a hobby that makes you money, doesn't get much better than that! Its too bad most kids my age are inside playing video games, and I'm out setting traps and catching dollar bills! I tried to get one of my friends into trapping last year when I lived up in Minnesota and got him permission on all kinds of awesome property with coons, fishers, beaver, and mink!! He didn't set a single trap cause he got a new Xbox.....what a bummmmmm! I would be drooling to be able to trap up there again!

Fur prices are good right now in SD, apparently "Dakota Style" raccoon is in high demand according to my fur buyer.

From the number of rat houses I see in eastern SD some one should be making a killing there.

That is a huge raccoon...what do you figure he weighed? It's a real pleasure to see a young person enjoy the outdoors instead of living inside a video game. These people are wasting the best part of their lives and it's a real shame their parents let them do it yet.

I weigh every coon just as a way to document them. The raccoon in the bottom picture weighed 24 pounds that I caught today. The coon in the top picture was no slouch either at 21 pounds! They aren't starving that's for sure, they each had a ton of fat.

My biggest coon ever weighed 32 pounds, I caught that one near Moorhead, MN last year.

quote:

Originally posted by p dog shooter:
From the number of rat houses I see in eastern SD some one should be making a killing there.

Yeah, I'm lucky, in my area there are more old, condemned buildings and old schoolhouses than there are houses being lived in. I have a buddy who has killed 19 coons out of one old house. Just seems like more move in.

This time of the year I catch almost only boar coons....?? Are the females all hibernating or what is the deal with that? Does anyone know?

big racoons! I did not know hides were back to $20.

Good for you! And $20, not bad. I sold quite a few many years ago and was happy to get $6.

Many years ago $6 was real money! 25 coons and you could buy a fairly cheap rifle.
Now, at $20, for 25 coons you can buy a fairly cheap rifle again.

I assume that $20 price is a cased hide or
is that just like he looks? Good luck with those
Varmints.

I was talking muskrat houses not old buildings.

quote:

Originally posted by crabyx78:
I assume that $20 price is a cased hide or
is that just like he looks? Good luck with those
Varmints.

Last year I did all my own fleshing and stretching and didn't really make as much as I would've liked to have. The time and effort was not worth it, when I only got about 5 more bucks per hide than my buddy who sold his hide on the animal. This year we are getting anywhere from $12 to $20 with the hide on the animal yet. I enjoy doing my own skinning, and so I get a couple extra bucks per pelt. $15 is honestly the average, but I expect to get about $20 for the two above.

Photo of the first 5 hides I ever fleshed and stretched. I ended up with 20 coon, 6 beaver, and too many skunks.

This is a great skill but it doesn't make sense to do because the man hours take so long. I wasn't the fastest flesher, but I got better as the season went on.

quote:

Originally posted by edholum:
This time of the year I catch almost only boar coons....?? Are the females all hibernating or what is the deal with that? Does anyone know?

They are getting closer to their breeding season. The females aren't as fired up about it as the males, so the females lay up as much as possible and the males roam. Very similar to a lot of animals in their early rut/breeding behavior.


Also, nice put up on those furs. Scraping a coon is a lot of work. I generally sell mine skinned but green.

I really miss the coon hunting and trapping we had when I was a kid in NE. I used to get in quite a bit of trouble from my parents for staying out too late. In the late 90's we were lucky to $8 for a prime coon (unskinned) and in the end we would barely cover the gas used to get to our traps and spotlighting areas.

oh for the old days....
1976 my grandad put up 109 coon and averaged 34.00 a piece
in 1979 he sold 31 bobcat for a 425.00 average
and we all remember when coyotes went north of a 100.00.
and i bought alot of hunting gear as a kid
getting 5 bucks for a muskrat.....

Wow

$34 in 1976 is the equivalent of $130 today.($130x109= $14,170)

$425 in '79 is about $1,300 today.($1,300x31= $40,300)

Man, that is amazing! I hod no idea trappers did so well back then.

quote:

Originally posted by ravenr:
oh for the old days....
1976 my grandad put up 109 coon and averaged 34.00 a piece
in 1979 he sold 31 bobcat for a 425.00 average
and we all remember when coyotes went north of a 100.00.
and i bought alot of hunting gear as a kid
getting 5 bucks for a muskrat.....

WOW! That's a lot of money! Wish the prices were still like that! I caught an 8 pound female today.

Yea if prices where that good again you most likely wouldn't be having as much fun. Back then every body and his brother sons daughters ect were trapping shooting or by any means trying to get fur bearers.

I had people stealing traps, critters, setting traps over the top of mine ect back then.

It was a very short lived period of high fur prices. Even better was the prices in the 1920's.

Back in the 60.s and early 70's I payed for a lot of stuff.

May be that Iam retireing I'll get back into a little traping.

Nice job putting the hurt on those coons. I just sold an ermine for $20.

I used to find a den tree, usually a large cottonwood, climb it, drop a rock down the hole, listen, if I heard coons, I would have my buddy send up a chainsaw, I would cut a hole big enough to stick my arm in with a .22 ruger pistol, empty it, climb down to the just above where I thought they were, cut another hole and chuck out the dead coons, all for $6 each. Best places some times was under grain bins and abandoned houses.