FLOOD-STAGE FUR TRAPPING

You would think that a water trapline is less affected than an upland trapline, but excessive rain can ruin water sets quicker than land sets. Keeping your water trapline working during extended periods of rain (and even afterwards) requires more work, more planning and more luck than any other trapping I can think of.

First let’s define a water trapline: consider any trapping around a permanent body of water a waterline. Certainly, beaver, otter, nutria and muskrats are water species and any open water trapping of these species can be affected by rain and runoff. Mink traps are also a waterline. Although they can be caught in upland habitat, most of us also trap raccoons at the edge