In the past, i have been involved in some discussion with some on here about baiting the hole at a dirt hole. Those that do seem pretty adamant that it is a necessity...

What are your opinions and experiences?

If you do bait, what do you use?

Homemade or commercially bought?

In the past i had always just lured the hole with a little plug of grass shoved after, but i think this year i was planning to use some commercially purchased bait to try, as well as whole mice that i catch. My thought is, I bait my coon and mink sets with fresh fish or muskrat, why wouldn't bait in the dirt hole help the canine line.

Several years ago I bet my trappin partner 50 bucks that I could catch a coyote with no bait, lure or urine. He took the bet and I made a dirthole set with nota anything.We were setting in red clay dirt. I had some sugar sand dirt that I had in a barrel in my truck and used it to cover my trap and created a dirt pattern around the set.

He lost the bet, only because I knew I was on location.

To answer your question about 80% of the time I use NO bait just a tad of lure and a shot of yote pee.

IMO, bait "can" help in certain circumstances. BUT as a general rule, I think lure and sometimes urine is all that is needed. Bait "can" keep a critter longer at the set if he decides to attempt to eat the bait but I find that Curiosity is what catches more dogs than hunger at a dirt hole. Also, For the few instances bait "might" help there are many more times it just leads to incidental "non target" catches. If there is a skunk or grinner already in a trap, you can't catch a yote in that one on that check.

Andy,
It can't hurt. If they like it enough, they will hang around and maybe work the set a little bit longer and if the trapping gods are with you, they will end up in shackles. If I am making a dirthole I put it down the hole. I use commercially bought baits as they seem to be proven recipes over time and take the learning curve out of it.

Denny

Have you ever tested baited v. non-bait in the same gang set and seen any difference?

Not tested but now that I think about it, 4 out of the 5 coyotes I caught last year were caught on baited dirtholes. The other was on a flat set. From that perspective, I will probably load up dirtholes with bait next year.

Although not necessary, I think the right bait can add to a set in certain situations. I use pocket gophers regularly in my area as they are common in hay fields here. I think coyotes spend plenty of time digging for these rodents here but I doubt they catch many, if any. Because of this, I think the pocket gopher here adds to the instinctual drive to finally catch one (kind of like willey coyote vs the road runner type thing). They simply add to my catch rate here in conjunction with lure and/or urine.

Last year I tried some of Dobbins bait solution with beaver meat. I did very well with this combo alone down a dirthole. This can be argued a lure/bait combo as well.

I have tried some other jarred baits without much luck, however. I did find that coyotes liked Marsyadas shellfish bait years ago, as the Coyotes kept stealing the shellfish bait out of my coon sets.

Ohio Andy, you got many varied answers. I agree with Billfrank, you can catch yotes with nothing but "eye appeal". However, I vary my approach but lean towards the use of bait. Both commercial and some that I make. For me, I believe that bait has increased my catch of coyotes, but not necessily fox or cats. I also like feathers where legal, their not just for cats either. All trappers methods vary and so should their sets from time to time. A good flat set or urine post is made more often, but I'll continue to use both lure only or bait only in my dirtholes. BTW, dirtholes I make may be mouse size or bigger holes. More often it will be the big hole that gets the bait.
Robert

Good stuff guys,I have some new ideas to ponder now.Thanks.

Im usually the opposite of most on this topic.I USUALLY prefer bait and NO urine.I also like double dirt holes with bait in one and lure in the other.I do like urine for my scent post sets though.Remakes are another story.They are already all urined up,and at these I dont usually re-bait them.Just make a sort of walk through set.I use several types of bait,but cat meat is tops on my list.

Bait = possum in my opinion.Next to a bottom that ran along a field I caught 27 possums on three traps. Stopped using bait and cut way back on grinner catches.

What type of bait were you using bow child? You avoid many non target catches with proper pan tension along with a better bait selection. A truly rotten bait= possoms and skunks.
Robert

They were fox sets(MB-550's) and big grinners. Dobbins bait mix(slightly tainted-maybe aged 5 days.) and blackies liquad predator bait.

If you caught 27 grinners out of one location, about the time you quit using bait, they were mostly gone.


I use a combination of both. One set with lure and urine, one with bait and lure, some with bait,lure and urine. All homeade baits and commercial lures. Experiment and find what works for you. I think I catch just as many non target animals with lure as I do bait. Seems like when you move into an area you need to clean out all the junk before you can start consistantly taking canines.

Well, maybe you got em cleaned out for next year. I really have found little diff. in lure or bait, as for as possums go. I set my traps up fairly heavy and don't miss many lite footed fox due to guiding and at least slight step downs. Guess I'm just lucky that I don't catch very many possums any more.
Robert

I thought that could have been the case but I set a scouting camera out in that area and there are a lot of them still left.

Some years I used nothing but lures and urine. Other years I used bait and urine (no lure except some gland for a few post sets). I didnt see any difference and now I usually go with whatever is faster and easier. Partway through the season I did throw in a few of the opposite of what I was useing for a change up. If you have the animals and put the trap at the right location you can use pretty much anything that has been proven.

Define bait.

Would bacon grease be bait or lure?

I always thought bait was a food the animal would eat,molasses grapes permissions fish etc and a lure was oils and or musks , urine etc blended just my 2 pennies worth

Thank you for the excellent replies guys. I assumed that i would get many of the answers that i did. But i like to hear other peoples perspective on the topic.

My plan wasn't to run just bait alone in the hole. I had planned to use bait and lure at the same set. Sounds like some do not. They just run one or the other. With the possums in my area, i don't think it matters what the stinky is as long as there is stinky there. I didn't catch lot last year, but i was running some pan tension.

Hobbie Trapper, i would say bacon grease would be a bait lure. Smells like bait (food), but it is liquid like lure. Was that spoken like a true politician?

One other thing that got me thinking bait along with lure, after i was done trapping, i still went coyote hunting in the same areas that i trapped. Toward the end of the season, i was using garage caught mice down the hole when i had them. As seen in the snow, the empty sets that had the mice seemed to be dug more than the lure only sets. This picture shows the set worked by a coyote:


There was another set nearby that the coyote cruised right by. he choose to work this one. Did he smell the lure through the snow or the bait or both? We will never know. In the end, i think i will be experimenting with some commercial baits and garage mice this year to see how they work, along with some "empty" holes nearby to test and track.

Keep this going, alot of good info here.