Longliners, Are there any left!

For years there were Longliners that would travel multiple counties mainly trapping raccoons and such.
Are there any left?
What changes have you made with the market the way it is?



B

Trap check laws in some States make that impossible today time wise.

Wisconsin's made it pretty difficult to almost impossible because you need permission at all road right-of-ways. Not trying to start anything. LOL

Yep the fact is things never get easier when the new rules come down, a perfect set up would be a 3 day check run 2 lines and handle fur on the third day!

Let the games begin! LOL

Even on 24's you can double your route.Luckily if I have to,I can pay $20 a day to have one line ran while I run the other,go back the next day and re-make and rotate.When it is feasible of course.There are many ways to increase production.

You guys need to stop thinking so small. LOL. "Any longliners left?" lol, LLL

I'm still here! Lol

Well... that is not a very nice Christian response to a honest question.

As for numbers of coon, I am sure plenty of trappers are putting up 2000 plus a season. Those 5000 plus longliners are probably far and few.

I have no idea how that statement could offend you sorry if it di. You say there are probably a lot of 2000 coon a season trappers. My question is how many do you personally know? I don't know of anyone ever over five thousand. LLL

I have added a line and plan to open another. If people are going to stay home when prices are low then I will move in. Once I get in it is hard to get me out. LLL

With An average of $21.59 for Western Raccoon , and only 31 % selling; that is just 1550 out of 5000. $33,464.50. If all 5000 sold at $21.59, that would be $107,950.

A loss of $74,485.50. Anyone looking at those numbers, would not be impressed.

Where is the loss? LLL

LL I believe canvasback is looking at it like a contractor. You figured you would clear/make $100,00 on a project but instead you only clear/make $80,000. That would be a loss of $20,000.

Well heck that happens all the time to me!! Lol

No that would be poor projection. If you are a retailer selling apples and you sell 31% of them on one day have you lost the other 69%? LLL

While we’re at it, what exactly is a long liner? As in, how many traps do they have to set, miles to run, or whatever else it takes.

I agree but all the contractors I've worked for think like that. Lol.
Anyway keep after it. Would love to run a long line before I pass on.

Read were Ray Milligan had three hundred predator traps set, got dumped on by two feet of snow. Went home and got another three hundred moved to a different area and set those. Picked the others up when the snow melted. How he could remember all the locations is beyond me. Course I can't get my head around making eighty to a hundred predator sets a day either.

In a couple of weeks me and my brother will be running 2- 150 mile lines spring beaver trapping. Is that long? At the end of each 16 hour day it feels long.

Sure sounds long to me. It may be all based on perspective and what we perceive as long...

When I retire in 13 years, my dream is do a pseudo long line... and run what I can..

Please post a picture thread like last year!


My version of "long lining" is walking way too far to check a couple of traps for very few critters... but I love it.

Don't wait till you retire- you only have today tomorrow is not guarantied. Even if your still alive in 13 years your body won't let you run a long line. DO IT NOW!

this is how i do it!

That right there is good advise. It always tickles me when I read how someone says they are gonna tear them up "when I retire". All things being relavent, you will not feel like you do now when you retire. Your brain says you can, but the body says no way!

Well, I’ll tear them up as best I can before I retire!!!

Wow, that's a lot of permission to get, and with State owned ROW's completely off limits now I figured it would kill spring beaver long lining too, good for you bottom lot.

It should feel long!

Long line can be subjective. Is it distance, number of traps or days, weeks or months? A person who sets say 200 coon sets over 120 miles and does that for 5 days and moves that 5 times is probably a long liner by definition for many, ditto long cat or canine lines. What about a person who sets out 200 sets for rats on open water for 2 weeks 2 miles from his house and then traps for 3 weeks through the ice with 140 sets 4 miles from his/her house? are they considered long liners? The old timers that did 12 miles per day on snowshoes and had two cabins would not be considered long liners by the definitions that many want to use today.

Bryce

Ain't that the truth!
Mac

Maybe I should explain. I've trapped hard all my life. Started my own welding business because I wanted to trap.Believe me, Financially I'd have been better off to work and not trap, but that is what I wanted, so that is the way life went. I'm not dissing anyone who says their going to trap when they retire, I just tell people that it is a pipe dream, your body won't go that hard when your old. That said, I'm 71 now, and I just don't have the strength and drive that I had when I was 60 or 50 ,40 or 30, Every ten years takes a serious toll. I am thankfull that I have been able to trap all these years, and will take every one I can get, but you gotta be realistic! Last season I trapped all season, in two states, and went as hard as I could,, at least for the first three weeks. I caught about a quarter of what I used to catch, and it was because of age. Still love it, just can't go that hard these days!

Good stuff Lee...coming from a guy that has retirement and ....big dreams on his mind.

Wife said I should wait til I retire, I could be crippled or dead by then, I could have made more money also, but wouldn't trade all those seasons for anything

Pretty much sums it up Lee. We would have more money if we didn’t start trapping. But the memories are pretty valuable.

Every ditch and creek I trap these years feels like a "long line" LOL

And the health benefits (if you don't drown) might be the most valuable assets about trapping. Especially as we get older. Been scraping coon and beaver just for that reason. Trapping them is the easy part.

The trick is not to wait until your all broke down to retire.Retirement in your mid 50's will give you a full pension(if you were forward thinking) also you should be debt free by then,and you should have a good 20 years to go full bore if you kept yourself in half decent shape.
However if you had a job where you were sitting on your arse for 35 years,forget it.You need to keep in good physical shape.

If one trapper sets 100 traps yet takes the same number of coon as the guy running 200, is he still a long liner?

A long liner doesn't necesarily run a ton of traps, or cover a ton of ground. Some learn to be more efficient, run less traps, yet reach the same outcome.

Dave,
I was wondering when you were going to join this topic. With your knowledge and experience you would know. So if you don't mind would you explain "Some learn to be more efficient". What changes????


Thanks
B

Unless you have an extremely high pop of the target species, simply throwing traps out at every potential location won't always lead to a higher catch. Some spots may be good for a couple catches and go dead, while others will be red hot and produce consistantly. I've learned to ignore the mediocre locations and only set the hottest spots. I also switched long ago to river trapping. I didn't drive more than 30 miles a day last season, yet took over 800 coon, with an ave of 100 traps set.

Most experienced longliners already are as efficient as they are going to be. I don't think that changes because of the price. Once you find a couple things that work the best then it is simply a scale thing and of course more time and ground replicating it. LLL

That's the way to do it Dave,keep the expenses to a minimum,time and monetary,and catch to trap check ratio high.
Checking empty traps is a killer.
Operating in an area with liberal trap check regs and dense populations will do it for you.

Most days I have the line checked by early afternoon. I step out of the boat right at the set vs parking the truck, climbing down a ditch embankment with equip, than carrying coon back up the ditch.

Line jumper I'm pretty sure he isn't gettin permission from lamdowmers for 300 miles of trapping. It is
More then likely roads that go through national state and county land! Good for you and the long
Line, the pictures from last year were awesome! Hope the casters are still nice and plump!

Dave how many miles of river do you run? How is the fuel cost? Live within a 1/4 mile of two rivers. In the near future I plan on running a river line.

The first line I run is about 16 miles of river. I use a 55lb thrust Minkota trolling motor for propulsion, and use 3 deep cycle marine batteries. The river I trap is 2 miles from my door, so the fuel expense is very minimal.

Bingo-people always ask me what type of set do you use mostly when you set 500+ traps.I say the same set over and over and over again.Simple and effective.

Very good info folks, Thank you for taking the time to respond.

B

So you use a trolling motor because of the river or to keep the wake down so it doesn't mess with the pocket sets?

B

If there's other boat traffic on the river, you can assume pocket sets will be washed out. That and the roof will be washed out and your trap buried.

If, on the other hand, you're the lone ranger, the trolling motor works well.

On a smaller river I ran for many years I was the lone ranger. Ran that mostly in the dark after work with the Go Devil, and hung chunks of license plates from overhanging limbs. The reflective license plate pieces told me when I could run full bore between sets and when I had to idle through so as not to wash pocket sets out. That was a real sweet river to trap, because you could predict water fluctuations. No rain upstream and this river dropped an inch a day. If it was a dry November I'd have several pockets working their way from the water's edge up the side of the bank where the water line used to be. Rain predicted and I'd move 'em back up. All on a 3-4 day check.

If you've got other boat traffic and/or extreme fluctuating water levels, there are plenty of other sets to take your 'coon: several poke holes vertical in the bank to account for the rise is water level, DPs up on the bank attached to "zip line" drowning cables, and portable pockets also up on the bank with footholds attached to zip line drowning cables.

Many river systems have a more stable backside to 'em, and that's where your pocket and blind sets shine. Tie up the boat and walk in 10 yards, sometimes you'll be surprised at the difference between adjacent bodies of water separated by a bank.

As far as the title of "longliner" is concerned, that image in my mind is someone who traps from sunup to sundown, and works up his fur when he can. I've never had that luxury, but did manage to run 300+ traps for three to four weeks on the river every late October through just before deer season, all after work and mostly in the dark. With a 4-day drowning check, all sets set up to drown, one can rotate through three lines, a hundred traps a line, and pile up quite a bit of fur in a short period of time.

With the loss of most ROW trapping here in WI, and the slump in 'coon, mink and beaver prices, longlining is about done for awhile.

16 miles with a trolling motor is something.

Back in the late 90s I ran 22 miles of river a day with a trolling motor, checking 200 pocket sets. Get on at 6 AM, and off by 2:30 pm. I'd ave 70-90 coon a day for the first week.....Was sure nice having kids, and nephews that did all the skinning back than. Paid them a buck a coon and they were happy campers! Wife would meet me at 2 pick up points to get the coon out, and fresh batteries in. Was in my 30s than. Can't quite go as hard now in my 50s.

Im running 14 different cattle farms and 2 small hunting clubs right now. Have about 150 coyote traps set over about 90 miles of hi-way travel. Places average from 120 acres to 800 acre tracts. Caught 5 coyotes and 2 coons today. During the spring From March 15 till May 1 its turkey season in alabama so I run my lines on several small farms . SOME feel 150 traps is longlining SOME dont.

Every time I go out it's a long line!

I agree with this. Contracting and trapping are completely different, you can't compare apples and oranges.

I met one and decided to tag along with him one day. I was more than happy to help him haul coons from the trap to his truck. After 25 it was no longer fun but hard work. We started early in the morning and finished up late that evening.


We ended up with 75 that one day. When I checked in with him at the end of the spring season he had caught over 1100 coon 100+ coyotes and 100+ beavers.

He has made no videos or taken end of season pictures as he mostly sells in the green

The guy was a machine

in the end, its the memories is all you have. so I am out doing all I can, while I can.

On some of my western lines I would be up before daylight checking traps one my wheeler on a 120 mile line usually back by noon skin those and run the other way another 75 miles. jump in the truck head out 175 miles to my second line and might get a few checked before dark, make camp gather firewood eat sleep sometimes under a rock ledge. get up finish runnin that line, set more traps and head back to the first line and main camp to get ready to start over in the morning. that's what I live for every year.