Anybody Foothold Trap Coyotes?

[steiny]

So I've tinkered with trapping all of my life and have had pretty darned good success snaring coyotes when we have snow on the ground. Not much snow last year so played around with foothold traps with a lot of failures and junk (coon, opossum, skunk, etc) catches, but I finally did catch one coyote.

I find this type of trapping pretty fascinating and challenging and intend to get after it again after deer hunting wraps up. A few questions if anyone is knowledgeable.

a. I will be cross staking with rebar, not using earth anchors. Is the short 10-12" chain that comes on trap adequate and is it important of necessary to add additional swivel or shock spring?

b. I like the idea of polyfill material under the pan and not using a paper pan cover, just dirt right over the pan. Thoughts?

c. A friend recommends simply covering traps with peat moss rather than waxed dirt. for simplicity. Thoughts?

[featherduster]

You need to talk to SCHALL53.

[brandon170]

If you are cross staking rebar then I stick with the shortest chain possible. Polyfil is all I use. You will still have to sift a little dry dirt over the peat to keep it from blowing away in the wind.

[ms660]

Dec 2, 2024 14:25:34 GMT -5 steiny said:

So I've tinkered with trapping all of my life and have had pretty darned good success snaring coyotes when we have snow on the ground. Not much snow last year so played around with foothold traps with a lot of failures and junk (coon, opossum, skunk, etc) catches, but I finally did catch one coyote.

I find this type of trapping pretty fascinating and challenging and intend to get after it again after deer hunting wraps up. A few questions if anyone is knowledgeable.

a. I will be cross staking with rebar, not using earth anchors. Is the short 10-12" chain that comes on trap adequate and is it important of necessary to add additional swivel or shock spring?

b. I like the idea of polyfill material under the pan and not using a paper pan cover, just dirt right over the pan. Thoughts?

c. A friend recommends simply covering traps with peat moss rather than waxed dirt. for simplicity. Thoughts?

The short chain will work fine but you need to add a swivel in the center of the chain and a swivel on the double stake fastener on the end . I never used shock springs.
What brand and size traps are you using? There are a lot of tricks you can do to modify your traps to make them a better trap. Laminating the jaws, center swivel the chain on the base plate, 4 coiling the springs.
Your double staking will work fine with rebar. Get you a pair of vice grips for pulling your stakes.
As far as a pan cover I have used wax paper, window screen cut to size, plastic sandwich bags, fiberglass insulation under the pan, and poly fill. Whatever works best for you. In a pinch I have used a leaf.
As far as a cover, we always went to an old sawmill in the summer, got old saw dust, dried it out, sifted it into 55 gallon drums, and used it sometimes mixed with dry dirt. When it was time to trap I filled 5-gallon plastic buckets with the dry sawdust and used them to carry to my set. Add a little salt if you need to freeze-proof it.
Back when We trapped hard for yotes when the live market was strong it was a must that they had good feet. All our traps were modified to prevent foot damage. We used mostly 1-1/2 or 1-3/4 coilsprings. There are taps made today that are pretty well ready out of the box to be used to prevent foot damage Good luck and catch a bunch!