Thought I would tease Fish as he can't have any.......

-TJ

LOL thanks Jimmy, I appreciate that. Good thing I am headed to the big town thursday night

You injured yourself just so you could go drink didn't you.

For some reason I can see you sitting in front of a computer monitor, staring picture of a bottle of beer, leg outstretched, hammer in hand.

WHACK!

"Um...yah...my knee is swollen and it hurts like the dickens...I think I should fly in to town to get dru...err...get it checked out"

That's the secret bait to getting a 12 pack....otter. If you have an otter and place it just right in your specified location, a 12 pack will come. Now, the quality of the otter will determine the quality of your 12 pack. The otter I used this year has been only effective on Milwaukee's Best and Schmidt. Had that otter been a little bit longer, it might have drawn in the elusive Rainer or maybe even a Blatz. Now if I could just catch a bigger otter.....I might.....

Sorry Len, didn't mean to put this in the otter thread, just being funny.

Man I wish I ahd the otter population Joe has I would be going nuts heck with beaver it would be all otter mittens My best yr ever was 34 out this way and I was hitting every location I found all season long

Kusko,

It was supposed to be a new thread. You know, the "Beer Sets and Techniques" thread.

-TJ

Yeah, you can't catch what is not there. I am lucky to be in awesome otter country. Horrible weather though. We really went at it the last three days and ended up running out of traps. This was new country and we had to find the spots, and it was better than expected. Decent chance that a majority of them are out of comission now though as it was snowing pretty good as we left. I wish I could post real videos on here, as I have taken about 7 hours of footage this season so far. Last trip got some real cool video of two otter. I allways like seeing them on dry land. It's cool. One of them had a pretty big fish also. I had real big dreams for those sets till it started snowing. We'll see.


Oh, and here is that picture of one of the four caught on the backcheck yesterday if I am supposed to put it here. I haven't quite figured out exactly what the new idea is...

From TrapperjoeAK
Great job on the otter. As far as on the holes, they usually will use the same path into and out of the holes and I set in that. Skinning and fleshing is just a bit of work, but I don't think there is much special too it. Great job on the mink also. Here is a picture of the otter snares that I use when I use them. I like conibears better, and I mostly used snares back when I only had 1 dozen 280's and would run out. They work pretty good though. It is just like the wolf snares that I think Dusty posted but smaller. 5/64 cable. About a 6 inch loop. The height off the ground varies a lot depending on circumstances. I always try for a neck snare, so I miss a few but brushing by a snare doesn't spook them so it is no big deal to me. Usually I have multiple sets on a trail anyways. About 4 inches or so off the ground is pretty good. Sometimes a bit higher. Fencing with dead grass or something really helps.

From TrapperjoeAK
When I set footholds for otter. I use #3's, but a good strong number two should be fine I would guess. Not a ton of experience on this as we have caught maybe 8 otters total in footholds over the years. The one thing I would say is do not wire your footholds off. Use cable or extensioin chain or something, but wire is a very bad idea in my opinion. I have never had the slightest bit of trouble with otter in 5/64 cable. But I am a big believer in smaller cable. This is 1x19. Here are some pics of snares afterwards. The first pic is a snare that made a catch last year, and the second pic is a snare catch from this year.






The second one is only as twisted as it is, because the otter got wrapped up around a stick and the swivel incapacitated, but as he was held almost completely off the ground he went down pretty fast anyways.

From TrapperjoeAK
I usually just put a bit of dead grass over it. Same as I do for mink. They fight pretty good usually. Here is a pic of one in a foothold. (I love all these excuses to trot out all my otter pictures :)) Once I got one in a foothold that was on a lift and even with the whole thing off the gound it was still trying to get at me when I was trying to dispatch it.

From TrapperjoeAK
We have never lost an otter out of a snare, but they have all been neck snared. I use conibears 95% of the time. I rarely use snares now that I have more traps. I used to use them primarily when I ran out of 280's. I have dispatched a bunch of otter, and I haven't found the need to shoot them, but they are pretty vicious. I used to just give them a knock on the head to put them down and then stand on their chests. The only problem is that it takes a LONG time for them to succumb this way. This season I tried something a little different just for the heck of it. I had a spare 220 with me for replacing traps, and I just popped it over the otters head. I know it sounds really weird, but it actually worked really good. It wasn't instant, took a few minutes; but one of the huge benefits was that I could work at remaking the sets, while it succumbed instead of having to keep my foot on it. Shooting is definitely an option... Just not one that I can comment on myself.

Question from TOp Jimmy

OK otter guys, I have another question. What size boards do you use to strech on? I am looking at getting a half dozen and need to decide between 7 or 8 inch boards. I was thinking of getting three of each so I had some varitety, kind of like Mink boards. What do you all think? Anything I should look for?


Response from Otterman
Jimmy around here most of my otter fit on an 8 inch board but otter do vary in size around the state. I do have a 7 inch board too just dont use it as much as the 8 inch ones.

Response from TrapperjoeAK
Maybe get 1 7 inch board. lol. I use 8 inch board 99.5% of the time. Like once every 3 years I catch some dinky little runt of an otter that I put on my one 7.

I could I could have added a lot more to this thread a couple of years ago. I don't have the pictures with me right now but when I get to Homer I will find some.
Here is a couple I had on line.
I prefer to set underwater in narrow channels that we have a lot of in the Lower Yukon Delta. Perfect
In trying to figure out a set for the 12-15 foot wide and wider streams I have used this set. I prefer to use a conibear but this is a snare set up.
I have a small stream that branchs off a larger one. About 10 ft wide the otter never seem to miss going in to have a look around. I set an outside bend. Fence it off with brush and sticks getting them close to the bank. It is a little deeper than normal so I set up three snares on this set. The location picks up 3-4 otter per year in the three years I set there.
Snares on pole with otter in the background. Snares are secured with a box nail that goes through an 1/8 inch ferule. Quick to place on the pole.
Fencing them into the bank will work on any size stream. Better to build fence early due to ice. But it keeps working all season. Just leave a narrow channel next to the bank that can be secured with a conibear or two. Or snare


On the top snare you can see my experimental attempt to hook up wires to use my continuity meter for checking. Using the snare cable as an electric current path- upon triggering the connection was pulled from the bullet breaking the current. If the bottom ones caught they would pull the first one down in there struggles. It worked. Just hook the continuity meter to the wire on one end and the snare on the other above the ice. Use on the conibear is easier to set up. No continuity Trap is set off. Using the bullet connectors is a good idea as it prevents a false reading when the wire ends acidentally touch the trap. Had beaver stay in a set for some extra time once when I had the elec wire hooked to a spring I forgot to take the safty trigger off of.

The meter is standard on my conibear otter sets. My otter sets don't get a lot of ice build up due to their locations in the small blackfish streams but it does build up. I keep it to a minimum with use of cardboard or plastic bags and snow on top of the hole. This is easier to remove than a foot of ice. Checking an under water set coverd with cardboard and snow in 30 seconds with a meter however makes for a lot of sets that can be checked in a day. Certain sets that do buld ice should be opened up every other 2 or 3 checks regardless. I would run my traps once per week. Otters can be left under the ice for up to two weeks without a problem. No more.
The cardboard works wonders on beaver sets as well. Even in the 30 below temps we had this winter my beaver sets never got more than a couple of inches of ice in 5 days.
With a good snow covering it works wonders. Cover with a good amount of snow.



Ice after a week of cold.




One of my favorite photos. Seemed we were always ending the line in the dark that year. The moon made for a great photo.


Fruits of our labor. Fully lined otter parka I made for my son.
Before otter prices came up.
Parka is inside out here to show the fur



There was a guy on the other forum, I believe from Kotz. He talked about putting a rapalla lure minus the hooks on a conibear trigger and catching otter. Anyone ever have any success with anything similar.

FT : I put herring on the trigger and catch otter in 330 conibears on poles. Set them in toilet haul outs, under ice, etc. I think artificial lures, white pvc, tin foil, etc would probably work to attract, but have not tried those yet. I plan to experiment with some of that next season. Never know till you try.

From Trapperjoe
Ok Loel. No otter that I put up. They are all sold, but I grabbed one of my Dad's and took a pic. This is exactly the way that I do it, except that I use pins on the tail not staples. I think that with pins it is possible to do a much better job on the tail. You have more control. I would of done it this same way, but stretched wider (it is hard to stretch with staples) and with straighter lines. So, for what its worth here are some pics, but I don't think much of this tail. lol.

Hey! Get rid of that nasty picture. lol. I put up a much nicer one later in the thread I think. Here they are again. Prety good evidence I think of why the staple experiment was deemed a failure.

OK Joe. We need to see a picture of the entire animal on the board from the belly side to round out the pictures. For me, I am a bit curious on the front legs. How short do you keep them. Kind of like Mink?

-TJ

I chop them off right above the paw before I start skinning. That is the fastest, easiest way for me, and then I do not do anything at all to them. They are pretty short all by themselves. If you cut them off too short, it leaves to much of a hole and I do not like how it looks when it dries.

Here is the belly picture of that otter, I do not know if you can see anything very well though. I took all these pictures earlier in the season.

Looks good. Thanks!

-TJ

Posted by TrapperjoeAK

In the warm weather last check I succumbed to temptation and set a foothold in the water for otter. #3 Montana underneath and behind the root. Pullout up above, and looked like just the kind of spot for the otter to decide to squeeze underneath the root. They have a definite preference to going under stuff instead of hopping over in my observations. I love setting footholds in water, as it is about the easiest way to cover a trap and the otter are definitely conibear shy in that area by now, but you know what happens to water up here...




Sure enough, it got cold and I just knew that spot was going to be frozen hard and I would have a job getting that trap out. It was... But, not only did I pick up an otter before it froze, it obligingly got up out of the water before it tangled up and expired. Very cool...





A double at another spot. You can just see the tail of an otter in a foothold on the far right of the pic.





The rest of the critter on the other side of the stump.