I was thinking about 3 day checking some dispatch muskrat checks. They would be underwater and the temperature is below freeze 30-20 degrees. Would three day checking ruin the fur / would it slip or how cold is it needed to keep the fur good for a 3 day check

Underwater, you will be fine.

some will be very soggy and hard to dry out as the leather may be soaked through, but they should be ok. youll miss alot of catches leaving them for 3 days though. the soggiest will be the ones with a break in the skin.

yep, a full trap is like having no trap there.

As stated above with animals like rats you'll lose out on fur.when I'm running big marshes for rats I check twice a day on weekends just to make sure traps are open to new catches

which period between twice a day checks catches more?

If you can keep the crawdads away from them.

2 words, Colony Trap

Rats are more nocturnal than anything else they still move during the day but more so at night the bulk of my catch is the first check because they soaked over night

Not terribly surprised about the night catches being better but if the evening checks weren’t worth it then i suspect you wouldn’t do them. Never heard of anyone doing two a days, caught my curiosity. Thanks for answering.

Sometimes it's worth the extra check a lot of times it's not i enjoy running traps so it's worth it to me either way I can always pack a scatter gun for water fowl or something similar and pull a two fer lol

when i was a kid 70s lot of guys check twice a day 12-12 , I use to really bring your catch up in numbers , to answer the question yes your rats should be fine

Your muskrats will have their legs chewed off by then. Not a good thing.

Yep,
Years ago our rat season came in on Thanksgiving day with Deer season opening the following Monday. To catch as many as we could before pulling our traps to do some Deer hunting, we'd check at midnight and again thru the day. You can clean them up in a hurry that way.

^ We would check twice a day also.

How do you figure that?

I have had times where I ran colony traps that would be packed full checking twice a day both checks. Once the catch slowed down I would move. I see no advantage in running three lines for muskrats and having soaked borderline slipped rats. You will take just as many or more setting heavy and checking more often and moving. You can tell real easy when it is time to move. Let the population determine how often you check.

I think the consensus is you should check them more often, valid reasons were given.

I was setting a pond at a golf course and emptied one trap 3 times before I got the ponds set up. Only happened once but it was cool.

Most decent rat lakes you should be taking 80-95% catch when starting
in fresh areas ,

So my guess is you can only check them every third day?. Any potential of coon catches? would they be drown too

Its late enough and the water cold enough , just soggy rats