Keeps you Outside in the Off Season. Once the hunting season ends, trapping season commonly continues for many months. Check your area to be sure. The more you are in the woods in the off season equates to more interactions with target hunting species such as deer and elk, it just happens. This essentially allows you to become more familiar with your favorite game. I enjoy learning about wildlife habits during specific times of the year because you force yourself to understand their habits.
Do they feel safer. Always have your head up and scan for game; Don't just stomp through the woods unaware of your surroundings. Take note of the locations where you see game and mark it on your GPS. You also might stumble upon really good sign, scrapes, rubs, antler sheds, and even dead game not retrieved from the general season.
This is essentially scouting!! Scent Control. When trapping certain predator species such as coyote, wolf, bobcat, linx, and fox, scent control must be practiced if you hope to be consistently successful.
Yes, there are people who do not practice any sort of scent control when hunting or trapping and still have success but from my experience if you want to have consistent success in the field you should practice meticulous scent control. Whitetail deer are said to have nearly million nasal receptors, whereas wolves are not far behind with nearly million nasal receptors See graph below.
Keeping a certain pair of boots stored away in a scent free area specifically for the purpose of hunting or trapping. At the very least when you are trapping you should be wearing scent proof boots, kneeling down on a scent free pad when making sets, wear gloves, and storing traps in a tub away from other strong odorous materials. This will get your mindset right when hunting season rolls around in terms of scent control. You will have certain practices and habits in place to make you a more meticulous scent control fanatic for the hunting season.
Practice like you play! In this case, trapping would be the practice and hunting would be the play! Does that mean we should do the same to other species? You are right that such a view is arbitrary, but most people in our modern, civil society agree with it. By your logic, one could say that rape is okay because it causes less suffering than being torn apart alive or dying of starvation.
But does that really justify rape? I am aware that trapping can be profitable. Drug trafficking and child porn can also be profitable. I am not putting trapping on par with those iniquities, but I am pointing out that profitability should not factor in to how we judge humaneness.
It is irrelevant. If my life depended on trapping a wolverine, I would do it, but in general, we humans as a group have found more humane ways to survive, even when some of us were convinced there was no other way.
Many people in the US believed that ending slavery would mean economic collapse, but lo and behold, we are surviving without it.
Trapping is not easy — As a camera trapper, I agree with you there. But so what? Once again — irrelevant. You say trappers are logical. Probably many are, but as in any field, there is very likely a range of abilities, behaviors, and standards. Some trappers are likely better than others at minimizing non target captures. But the fact is that non target captures remain a serious concern, and it is extremely difficult to monitor it.
Your final point about the warmth of real fur is a good one, though. Just came across this article the other day. First off I wanted to say that this was one of the most balanced articles about trapping I have ever read. However, I did want to mention something in regards to your statement about foothold traps harming a trapped animal. To obtain the otters for reintroduction, the foothold trap was used. The traps were checked once every 24 hours.
However, no otters died as a result of injuries, although it appears some died of stress while being transported. Once the otters were successfully reintroduced, the majority did very well. From what I could find, the otters that died were shown to have died of causes unrelated to trapping.
Several pdfs easily found online back this up. Thanks for your message, Jackson. I was not able to find anything specifically on the causes of death of the trapped and released otters. Can you share the links? One caution about interpreting cause of death in an animal released from a foothold trap. For example, an animal with a painful foot or leg might have greater difficulty obtaining food or fleeing from predators. An otter released from a foothold trap might die of starvation or predation because its sore foot hampered hunting or fleeing.
But the cause of death would still be starvation or predation. But most wild animals live on the edge of starvation, and a slight disadvantage could cost the animal its life. In such a case, relatively few individuals suffer, while the species as a whole stands to benefit immensely.
I appreciate that you tried to be objective, but I could tell within two seconds of viewing this article that you are biased. I know because before I took part in trapping, I was biased too. It is impossible to truly understand something without actually being close enough to it to be objective.
Not to be off topic, but this is a problem throughout all of our society where people harden their viewpoints based on issues without having real experience on either side. This is why people forget that those on the other side of the fight are actually good people with good intentions, just like themselves. Anyways, back to trapping. Not just a little bit false, but more like propaganda false. At least the trapper carries the true weight of what it means to live and take life rather than being a cog in the industrial wheel that takes many, many, lives.
I appreciate your comment but I could tell within 2 seconds of viewing it that you are biased. I know because I have done a careful study of the available research and interviewed trappers, while you have merely presented your personal opinion. Further, you perpetuate a problem within our society of hardening your view based on nothing but your own opinion, no attempt to acknowledge your bias, a complete dismissal of everything I presented, failure to acknowledge my conclusion of beefing up trapper education, monitoring, and trap specificity, and an assumption that I cannot see that there are good people with good intentions who disagree with me.
You see, I can play that game too. You may or may not know this, but not all trappers agree with you. I have a friend who had trapped for decades but gave it up when, he says, he finally came face to face with the fact his view that trapping does indeed cause extreme suffering. He did not want to be identified by name, so I did not include his words in my article. It might interest you to know that he thinks much of what trappers say to make it sound more benign, is propaganda.
I recall at least one wildlife biologist, offhand, who regrets having been a trapper, but he was not able to appreciate the degree to which trapped animals suffer his opinion until after he began working with wildlife in another capacity learning about their biology, tracking, gps collaring, etc. We are predators, period. No discussion as to how much suffering, no attempt to weigh the pros and cons. No comment on striving to minimize suffering.
At least he admits that trapping causes pain and suffering. So my question to you is, if we are to base a judgement about the humaneness of trapping on opinion alone, whose opinions matter?
Only yours? Should the opinions of other trappers matter, and what if they disagree with you? How about people who study animal biology and behavior?
I disagree roundly with your view that a person must have first hand experience trapping to develop an informed opinion about whether it is humane.
I wonder if you think the same about various forms of torture, like waterboarding, solitary confinement, or forced sleep deprivation. Do you need to inflict it on others to know they cause extreme suffering? Your final point about the costs of making clothes from synthetics is excellent, and I agree with it. I believe I said as much in my article. That is a very important point, but not the only point.
What I was trying to do was to decide for myself and I encouraged the reader to do the same, rather than to just accept my conclusions if trapping is a good thing on balance. In my opinion, it is not enough to say anything that protects wildlife habitat is automatically good. We could raise money for conservation with prostitution or drug trafficking. Would that be good? The reason is that those things involve other evils, just as trapping does…in my opinion.
And I think you did. You may also want to peruse this study documenting injury from both padded and modified padded foothold traps. Fantastic blog post! I admire your tenacity in responding to commenters who jump to conclusions without bothering to actually fully read your stance and conclusions e.
But, that is the way it is when building awareness. You clearly have a passion for education in this area and I am grateful for folks like you who have that patience. I am the same way when it comes to other things e. Thank you for the extreme amount of work and attention that went into producing this post. Keep up the great work! Regarding the subject of trapping, I have a B.
I also served as the environmental lead for the LEED chapter in my city among several other similar activities , so I have a bit of understanding of this and related topics and environmental issues such as green building and LEED and ecological systems e.
I fully agree with your conclusions. I loved that book! You seem like the kind of person that would appreciate it as well. Thanks again for your efforts! Thank you, Holly, for your comment.
I really appreciate the fact that you took the time to read through the entire post as well as the comments. You are right that a ton of time and effort went into creating this post.
I will check out that book you suggest. Skip to primary content. Skip to secondary content. About NTA The National Trappers Association is committed to defending and promoting the safe and ethical harvest of furbearing mammals and to the preservation and enhancement of their habitats. Fifty-one state trapping affiliates make up the core of the national organization representing thousands of fur harvesters from every portion of the country.
The National Trappers Association and its members continue to research and encourage the development and usage of the most effective and humane trapping techniques available. Furbearers, like other managed wildlife species, thrive and are far more diverse today then years ago. The National Trappers Association continues to defend our American Heritage and the sound management of all wildlife for the future enjoyment and use by all sportsmen of North America. We thank all members and organizations for their dedicated support.
Destroying the Myth. This NTA produced video explodes the heart of the anti-trapping strategy by exposing it as false. Click video to view. Membership Specials. The NTA offers special membership campaigns throughout the year. Join with us to help preserve our heritage. Visit our Advertisers. In a world where humans interact with wildlife habitat in countless ways, management of certain animal populations will always be necessary. Uncontrolled, many species can infringe on real human needs.
Regulated trapping helps control furbearer population growth and reduce furbearer damage at no cost to the public, and does not threaten the viability of furbearers population. Role of trapping in conservation Humans have changed nature in important ways: e. Trapping does not endanger species The animals used in the modern fur trade are abundant.
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