Good job Scott! I have been out some trying but no luck yet. It has been several years since I have called in and killed a cat. Called one up that I know of last year but am convinced that I have called in more but just never see them.
Yep. Easy to tell by the spots.
Its illegal to keep a bobcat captive in Oklahoma. No matter that you trapped it.
The cat has to be released or dispatched.
You can keep them during the season Dennis. Me and Lt Jon Cunningham used to keep them to collect urine from for trapping but you have to be rid of them by the end of the season.
OK, I'll buy that. I knew a guy that trapped and kept one in a pen for awhile. I went and saw it in the spring. Word got out, and Tracy gave him two options. Kill it or release it.
I seem to have a lucky feather when it comes to bobcats. Called 33 in one season a few years back. Wish my deer hunting was as good at times.LOL!!! You probably are calling them and not seeing them. I've got a good friend that calls 3 times as many coyotes as I do but rarely sees a bobcat. It's usually where you set up and call that makes the difference. Keep after them and it will happen.
When I was growing up, my Gpa was a govt trapper in Childress, Texas. He frequently had either a bobcat, a coon or a coyote in a cage collecting the urine and feces for trapping. Several times, he raised up a bobcat from a newborn - from bottle feeding on up. Declawed and tamed 'house cats'. They can purr so loud it sounds like a freight train. Childress high school mascot is the Bobcats and he used to walk up and down the sideline at football games with his 'pets'.
He would bury a couple of traps around a half of a jackrabbit and you could not tell he had ever been there.
He would bury a couple of traps around a half of a jackrabbit and you could not tell he had ever been there.
I would sure like to ride along with a guy like that and learn from him. Those guys are getting old and I am convinced we are losing a lot of their knowledge.
I sure miss him! He always drove Datsun/Nissan pick-ups - he said they lasted longer than anything else he tried...Chevy, Ford, Jeep, Dodge. He would take those things anywhere. Plus, they were smaller and easy to maneuver. I spent a lot of time with him making his runs. He ALWAYS carried a minimum of 2 spare tires with him and more when he knew he was going to an area with more mesquites or thorns. He repaired his own flats every evening. I was with him one day when we had 4 flats before noon. He carried extra spares that day! We had to get them repaired in town at lunchtime in order to have some for the afternoon and to make it home.
Another time, he had me get out before he tried driving through an area that had been washed out by the rain. Yep...turned it over on it's side! He climbed out the driver's window (now on top). We used a come-along and sat it back on it's wheels and pulled it up to more level ground. Loaded all his spares and supplies back in the back and took off!
In his traps, he used screens to keep sand from filling in under the pan. He'd used spring steel under the pan to keep smaller critters from tripping it. He tied a piece of bright colored ribbon to the spring steel so he could find it laying around after catching something in the trap.
He'd use roosters in cages and set traps around the cage. Off in some plum thickets, up near the Red River, we were carrying feed and water for a rooster - and to check his traps. We heard the rooster raising all kinds of ruckus. As we got closer we could see what was causing the stir. There was a coyote sniffing and getting closer to it. We just sat and watched. After about 20 minutes, that coyote stepped in one of the traps! It let out a yell that would have given Bigfoot chill bumps! It couldn't jump very high because of the plum thickets and brush - nor did it get very far. The drag on the chain got caught up pretty quick. I went back to the truck for his gun and supply bag. That coyote stepping in the trap kinda reminded me of one of those little red balls on a rubber band connected to a paddle. Only a real short rubber band! He kept changing directions every time he ran into something and was howling like crazy. The rooster didn't make a sound at that point!
I watched him set so many traps...I feel like I could do it just like he did. But I know that's only in my best dreams. He definitely left no evidence of human existence where he set his traps. He sometimes used a little cyanide shooting device called an M-44 (official govt name) - he just called them 'gitters'. A lot of folks didn't like them, but they worked 100% of the time. Every time we ever had one pulled - there was a dead coyote pretty dang close by. One thing he always did when he used these - he put them in a hole, instead of just on the surface of the ground. He'd dig a hole with an old flower bulb digger and put these under ground level, yet still accessible to the coyote. Once bitten, they died in a matter of seconds.
I have lots of wildlife stories because of him...a snare cut through the windpipe and the coyote lived, a coyote with no bottom jaw, 3-legged coyotes, 3 raccoons sleeping in the back of the truck with my brother...but I probably have hi-jacked this thread long enough!
Cool stories! Those guys are incredible at what they do. I followed one once as a kid along with my dad and learned a lot of coyote grapping from him...........most of it was snares though, I wish we could use them.
No reason snares shouldn't be legal.
The cyanide was hell on secondary kills by carrion eaters picking on the carcasses of the dead coyotes. I'm glad they stopped that.
The cyanide was hell on secondary kills by carrion eaters picking on the carcasses of the dead coyotes. I'm glad they stopped that.
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