Christmas vacation..

[ol_spark]

So my duck shooting, pheasant chasing, archery hunting grandson has a few days off school for Christmas vacation and decides he wants to trap beaver since the weather has warmed up and he has no deer tags left for muzzleloader season. I had a few leg hold traps but off we go to the local gun store and purchase a couple conibear 330s. We knew of quite a few places where beavers had dammed up creeks on the game lands but opted for a private property land because we knew the landowner wanted rid of those pesky critters. I really didn’t have any beaver castor or lures of the sort so we just made a couple fake runway sets and left wondering what today would bring. Wouldn’t you know it, during the night, the stupidest beaver in the colony tried to swim through one of his 330s. Ole Jeremiah Johnson couldn’t have been happier with his first beaver than my grandson. Who knows what this hide will turn into. Maybe a beaver tail wallet or some mittens. I’m certain he’ll have major plans for it because our fur prices are ultra low and from what I understand beavers are not in demand anyhow. The adventures continues, at least until school starts back up. Lol

 

[huronmtns]

The expression on his face says it all!
One proud young trapper. The fur quality is about as good as it can get being caught this time of year. The tail needs to be 4" wide for a decent functioning wallet. Beaver tail wallets are very impressive for durability. I have one and wished I would have bought one many years ago.

Give that young man a congrats on his first Beaver from a forty plus year trapper. It's great seeing this later generation engaging in trapping. It's not nearly as common as it was back in the 70's and 80's.

 

[huronmtns]

This could be an option for what can be done with that Beaver too. A wall hanging hooped Beaver will keep his first as a solid memory.

 

[geetar]

This could be an option for what can be done with that Beaver too. A wall hanging hooped Beaver will keep his first as a solid memory.View attachment 123880

Those hooped beaver pelts are timeless classics.

 

[ol_spark]

Thanks for the idea huronmtns. I’ll certainly show that to him. I’m not certain at this point what he wants to do with it. His Dad has checked traps with him since he got the first one but he hasn’t had any luck since then. I went today with him because Dad was back to work and suggested he move sets so we’ll see what tomorrow brings. Pennsylvania has so restrictive rules about trapping beaver as they do everything else but it’s always an adventure when we are together. It’s been raining here a lot lately and today when we went in to check traps, I thought we shouldn’t be driving in here tomorrow. Just then my truck slides sideways because we’re on a side hill and before you know it my truck is headed downhill. Brakes don’t work, it’s like sliding on ice, I jam it in reverse because I’m already in 4 wheel drive and punch in. Didn’t help much but we finally got stopped about 6” from a big maple tree that was centered on my grill. Whew! So I called my youngest son, who wasn’t home but said he could get there in about an hour. I told him to bring chains and don’t drive to where I was. Now it starts to snow and by the time he gets there we have an inch of snow covering the wet ground. Son doesn’t even get his truck turned around and he’s stuck. He didn’t have tire chains for his truck but he brought his son and another truck with him. No tire chains for it either. We both agreed best thing to do is not bring the other truck in to where we were. I’m calling my wife to bring the tire chains for my truck and a couple pair of come alongs but no answer. Left messages everywhere for her. In the meantime my son calls a good friend with a tractor. Four wheel drive John Deere to the rescue. No sweat for him to pull us both out. Wanted to pay him for fuel, time or just show appreciation but he wouldn’t have anything to do with that. He said his tractor hadn’t been run in awhile and besides he needed a good laugh. We’ll be walking in there tomorrow. First thing I did when I got home was throw my tire chains in the bed of my truck. Like my buddy used to say, “no sense in being stupid unless you show it once in awhile”. You’d think a guy my age would no better. Lol

 

[wytex]

Send that hide to Moyle for tanning, I have several. They do a good job and he just might sell it for more than he has into the tanning.

 

[ol_spark]

Wytex.
Thanks for the heads up. I’ll check them out. He’s got two now. Yahoo!

 

[Sask hunter]

Congrats young fella