Mink: I'm At It Again!

[Guest Ditch_Shitter]

Just no stopping me, is there? Ok. Here we go again. Imbra and Juby traps, I've proven to my own satisfaction, will catch a mink. However, they're more likely to catch bloody leverets first. Not the game plan, so I'm now embarking on another experiment / learning process. Being the sort of bloke I am, I thought I'd drag all you poor b*stards along with me too. The trip starts here. And I can see this being an even longer and more arduous journey than the heavy metal approach provided - if no less thrilling. For me at least. Can't speak for you lot.

 

So, strap yourselves in. Pin your ears back and watch as the story unfolds down the coming weeks once more. Story, no doubt, of utter failure and yet unstinting willingness to keep right on inflicting my ineptitude on the laughing vermin of Leitrim and who ever of you poor souls find yourselves bored enough to come and read all this drivel.

 

Ok. Today I recieved six Mink Snares. For the record; These snares came swivelled and with some guidance notes on where and how to position them. I digested that and, unable to contain myself a minute longer, headed off out the door. Now, four hours later, I'm back. 'Four hours to drop six wires?!'. You may cry. Well, yes! Quite frankly, when there seems to be a mink run in every ditch it becomes a matter of agony which ones to cover. I spent far more time chewing my lip than messing around, setting the buggers. Anyway .....

 

First thing that wrecked my chances were the Tealers. I didn't have any. Being the bright spark that I am, of course, I sorted this by cutting and taking along some six inch strands of stock fencing wire. Woefully inadaquette lengths, six inches! That was the first thing I discovered, once I was well away from home. Make a note of that.

 

I can't honestly remember how I got round this on my first hedge / ditch set. But I found a beauty on my own land - beyond where the dogs or my stock are able to go, naturally - and set one there. Come to think of it, I did manage to cut out two longer lengths of wire and so I probably fiddled one of those into it. I do know I've also now learned that mink wire doesn't react like rabbit wire. Thus I'm yet to work out a practical way of hanging the stuff from any form of tealer head I could fashion. Getting the idea now? Yes. You're ahead of me, aren't you? A complete f***ing disaster, from start to finish! Never mind. We press on. As I did. Here's an example of how my efforts look:

 

 

 

More In Desperation Than Intelligent Design

 

 

 

So, that's pretty typical of what I've been up to out there then. Fist sized loops, set quite low to the ground. I'm basing that premise on what I've seen Woodga do with his fox wires; I.e. Use an outsized loop and, at least when they go under a fence, set low. I'm also told I should use a little chin stick, on open sets? Well, none of my sets were that open so I tried to judge how high a mink might lift his feet as he slows to enter cover and - in most cases - clambour down into a ditch. See my reasoning? Seemed worth a try anyhow.

 

Now, there was one spot I was simply gagging to get a wire to from the first moment I saw it. I found a wind fallen branch laying along the very edge of a ditch! There was a nice, obvious mink run / slide down the ditch side. I re found that spot today, from the opposite side, and hung a noose there. Having taken a good run of multi strand, flexible yet strong tying wire and side cutters with me, I simply tied the swivel to the branch. My earnest prayer being that a mink will find himself in the noose and then tumble down into the ditch and hang himself.

 

Here's a shot of that one, from the land side, looking toward the fatal ditch. It doesn't look much of a run, from this angle, but believe me; It's a cracker!

 

 

 

Close to the Edge

 

 

 

Well, I have further shots but, as they too feature hedge / ditch hole sets, I won't bore you with them. However, for those of you who looked at the ill fated Imbra and Juby thread, here's that delicious girder bridge again. I now know who trashed my Coni Cubby set on that bridge and now I've very deliberatley wired this snare onto the girder. If a mink goes into it? I hope he'll fall off and hang. If matey's stupid enough to put a foot in it? I hope it'll hold long enough to unbalance him and send the b*stard headlong into that weed choked, muddy ditch!

 

Anyway, here it is again, look. Same bridge. Differant treatment:

 

 

 

Snare on the Styx

 

 

 

And there we have it then. Round One with the wires. Perhaps if any of the Three Wise Men of the Wires should find this and get this far with it, they may put me out of my abject misery regarding the three biggest questions all this threw up for me, please? They are:

• How should I fashion some tealers for mink snares?
   
  
• What sized loop is best?
   
  
• How high should the bottom wire be, on a 'Hole in the Hedge' set?
  

Thankyou very much for any guidance here

 

 

Very well. I'm off to feed my dogs and milk my goat. It'll be dark by then and the mink will start moving. Tomorrow, when I surface, I shall take my camera and trapse round inspecting a serise of knocked over, pushed aside, missing or just plain wind blown mink snares. You know it. I know it. And if, by some miracle, I should have caught anything? Then the dogs will be getting bloody leveret for tea! It's just got to happen, hasn't it?

[moley 115]

so you set some snares then , eh?

[Guest Ditch_Shitter]

That's the general idea, mole man. Only, er; Do you think you just might have added your own customary one liner without feeling the need to repeat my entire post? Was there any point in that?

 

Edited it Ditchy....MOLL.

[Phil Lloyd 10,736]

Edited July 31, 2006 by CHALKWARREN

[Guest Ditch_Shitter]

Thanks for that, Moll :kiss:

 

 

Chalkie: " Make your own runs - Think about it ".

 

Christ almighty. Now how stupid do I feel?! I have it right here in front of me. In writing:

 

 

" Make runs by stamping your foot along the grass ..... "

 

 

In my undue haste to get out there and give it a crack, I'd somehow confused that with another instruction which I now see concerns traps. Balls! More speed. less haste. Oviously.

 

Oh well. As the sun goes down over Ireland and the gathering gloom closes in, somewhere out there an innocent leveret is munching its last meal of grass, no doubt. Finding that ~ and probably untold and unimagined other callamities awaiting me tomorrow ~ I'll probably be so disgusted I'll rip the lot up and start over again. This time doing the Crop Circle Dance around the ditch heads first! :whistle:

 

Dogs fed. Goat milking time. Hope to catch 'you' in Chat presently.

[Guest Ditch_Shitter]

Ditch; thats one deep relationship!

 

 

Not at all, Dandy Man. It's just a job of work. Only it's not one that anyone's paying me for just yet and so, were I not planning to bring in some expensive fowls here, I likely really wouldn't give a damn about the minks presence. I'd consider them someone elses problem. As it is, I want to get on top of them before they become mine. There are easier and more assured methods I could use. But I want to Learn new sh*t and, through all this discussion of it, hopefully help others get the knack That's all

 

Anyway, Day One:

 

Keeping it brief and simple: Two wires knocked aside, I suspect leverets. Reset those because it's starting to look like maybe we could spare a hare here. And anyway, I figure mink will come after them, so ...

 

Three wires perfectly as I left them. Good. At least they held and didn't get pushed by the wind or anything. Left them as is. They're patient and so am I.

 

The Bridge! You knew it. I knew it. It just Had To Be the f***ing Bridge over the Styx! Third time lucky? Maybe. Only this time, when I saw the set had been disturbed and couldn't see the snare at all, I figured Johnny had been back. He hadn't. I traced the wire down, off the bank and into the water. Loop was closed up to barely half an inch of loop. Damn!

 

Now, if you go back up and examine the photo of that original set, I'm sure you too will agree: I was winging it there. In fact, it wouldn't be too unkind to say I was wasting my own time. That bottom wire is patently too damn low!

 

Ok. Got what I deserved then. Big ol' mink's come across there. Gone into my loop and got his foot snagged. Probably a back one. I reckon he's then spun round. Had an altercation with himself and instinctively plunged for the safety of that water. Foot just managing to slip out as he went. You reckon?

 

Oh well. No way on this earth would I wish to have a mink by the foot. Today I've raised that bottom wire Right up. I tried damd hard to picture a mink, coming foreward confidently. Looking ahead of himself across that clear run of girder to the other side. Maybe, if that happens tonight, he'll push into my bottom wire with his broad chest? That happens and he jumps for the water? He'll be there tomorrow

 

We'll see.

[Ricky-N.p.p 0]

Good luck mate

[Guest Ditch_Shitter]

One wire gone.

 

This is the one I'd had to anchor to a rock. The rock I used was of such weight that, mink or hare, anything getting into the noose would throttle itself if it tried to drag that stone away. An examination of the site suggest Brother Bill ~ Again!

 

We've all seen the Survival programmes? Pack of hyaena's get together and work their collective arses off all night, finally managing to bring down a whole zebra or wilderbeast. Damn thing's barely stopped kicking before a male lion saunters up and sneeringly helps himself to the total fruits of Their hard labour? F***ing badgers are like that round here. I stop it. They pick it up.

 

I'd use Benders. Get my stuff up, out of their way. But then, this is such open country that anything so exposed would act as a beacon to Johnny for miles around. I'm just praying that badgers don't deign to dine on fresh mink!

 

All else exactly as I left it. Except Styx. That one, I'm quite sure, had simply dropped down due to the weight of it's own slider and my ineptitude at sorting that tealer up right. I've adjusted things now. We'll see.

 

Main problem is here; I'm now down to just five wires for as many acres. And there's probably four times that many badgers, per acre. It's simply f***ing ridiculous

[Ricky-N.p.p 0]

Have you tryed cage traps mate ?

 

i used them before and it seemed alot easyer than snaring

[moley 115]

Have you tryed cage traps mate ?

 

i used them before and it seemed alot easyer than snaring

 

stick with the snares shitty, you,ll get a bugger sooner or later

[Guest ragumup]

Have you tryed cage traps mate ?

 

i used them before and it seemed alot easyer than snaring

[/quot MY THOUGHTS ALSO

Edited August 2, 2006 by ragumup

[woodga 170]

GET YOUR WIRES UP A BIT HIGHER AT LEAST 4 INS OFF THE GROUND.

USE A CHIN STICK TO MAKE THE MINK LIFT ITS HEAD INTO THE NOOSE ALTERNATIVELY USE JUMP STICKS EITHER SIDE OF THE SNARE 3 TO 4 INCHES IN FRONT OF THE SNARES THIS WILL BREAK THE MINKS STRIDE AND ALSO MAKE HIM LIFT HIS HEAD . STEEL FIXERS 1.5MM BLACK ANEILED TIE WIRE MAKES GOOD TEALERS FOR MINK

GOOD HUNTING ALL WOODGA :ph34r:

[teckel 3]

we use catch alive baited with a tin of tuna works every time open the tin and poor the jucies all over the place so there is plenty of smell cover the trap so it dark and you will get your prize

[woodga 170]

........

Edited August 3, 2006 by woodga

[Guest Ditch_Shitter]

Thanks for all the comments, lads. Your support really does help

 

Now, to respond to the points, while I remember them (forgive me if I don't use names, only I'm trying to remember the comments alone, never mind who made them! So, to generalise ...)

 

I know cages / grippers / rafts etc would have had my hat festooned with mink tails by now. I'm used to such things, and that's just the point. As soon as I find the rats are coming in and making themselves obvious I intend to follow P&G's excellently illustrated threads and have a crack at wiring them too. Because it's New to me. See? (Actually, I was instructed, decades ago, how to snare rats. But P&G's 'nail' method blew me away. I'll forego the notched sticks and try that way. Again; Learning something new )

 

Another reason for my insistance on these wires is that I don't have any way available of humanley and efficiently despatching a mink. Thus I need to let it do that for itself. A quick drop and short struggle off that girder over the Styx will ensure that, I'm sure. Catch them in cages and, with no gun, it wouldn't be good.

 

One thing I've realised here, as I sit down and write about / review each days proceedings, is that I'm simply going too fast. I get up, check here and then rush off to check my work, before rushing onto something else. Rush, rush, rush. Wrong! Result is that I've never yet stopped to gather some decent tealers or pegs, see? As Beelzebub hints; Had I pegged that wire properly, I might well have saved the snare. Badger would've torn the catch out of it and left me my precious wire. Tomorrow I'm going no where so shall take the time to sort some proper kit out. I may not have access to Woodger's specific wire, but I'll find something.

 

And now the questions which still plague me: I'm still guessing about the size of the loops to use here. Also, with or without that wire; I'm absolutley frustrated about getting Any sort of twist in the top of a bit of wire which will hold the damn loop correctly I remember P&G saying how he'd set a kink in his wires - on more than one occassion, I believe? - so ensuring that the loop 'sprung closed' to a degree? Well, I don't want to wreck any of my own, limited stock by snapping and twisting them. And I do have a spot of bother with these particular 'Eyes'. (Those who Know will know what I'm refering too. Bit weighty, when set at the top. Am I doing something wrong there?)

 

Anyway, tomorrow's another day and I'll just keep frigging about till I get it right. There's a world of differance between reading books or internet postings and actually getting out there and discovering the whelter of befuddling little variables which f*** us up. If I can manage to find my way round just one such blocker each day? Well; I may yet snare myself a mink by the end of the year!

 

'Jump Sticks', Woodga? Damndest thing; Only today, as I reset that Styx wire and contemplated the fact that I can't get a 'Chin Stick' into that metal girder, I wondered about using a stone ~ like with trapping, to make the bugger step where we want him to ~ but dismissed that as not quite what I needed. Not quite. But I'll certainly bear the jumps in mind. Food for thought there, indeed.

 

And that, finally, is what it's all about here, lads. Someone mentioned earlier that my obsession with wiring them seems a bit personal? Exactly so! It Is personal! Like a game of Chess. He thinks. I think. He does. I counter. The mink and I are fencing. I'm developing my strategy. One of these days I'll fine tune my game till I see the chink in the armour of his natural behaviours. Then I too shall start reeling the buggers in. But I'll be doing so by the skill of my own hand and eye. Not some factory produced, sure fire double gated cage. See?