BigGameHoundsmen.com

First I am in no way much of a trapper,I just fart around with it at time for something to do. I was told that if going after yotes that if there is alot of activity at night that covering the trap is not as big of a deal cause they don't see as well and are more careless at night. So for those of you who do some serious trapping what do you think?

He said after bedding the trap fill to the jaws and put a handful of grass spread lightly on the pad and be done. no cover, no sifting. no cover scent.

My reason for asking is my 15 yr old brother is wanting to try it out and wants my help, if there is some truth to it then I can be more laxed on his sets and let him get some confidence and then build into the more invisible traditional yote set. The dogs around my dads place only seem to be around after dark we did alittle calling with no luck ( I can yote call) but a few nights a week they are in the draws singing most of the night. I'm going to get him setting some live coon traps and maybe some rat traps in a slough also. Thanks Lance

Does the man who is telling you this catch a lot of coyotes this way? If he does I would pay attention to what he says (unless he is trying to nutralize his competition). I have been with four top coyote trappers in my life who all covered their traps completely durring the times I was observing. I know one thing though, a trap that is frozen down has zero chance of catching a coyote. The method you describe would help prevent freeze down. If you have enough traps, try both methods and keep records to see which produces the most catches.

He talked like he catches his share, we will see what happens. times like this I wish my great grandad would have lived longer that cranky mean old man could hang hide. Thanks Lance

Lance, two of the men I spent time with were government trappers so made their living trapping coyotes. One of them kept repeating these words to me and even though it was over thirty years ago, I still see him making sets and I still hear these words: "the back door Dave, the back door. He's coming in the back door". He might have a typical coyote set, but then he always found the back door to whatever the attraction was, and that is usually where he caught the coyote. For example he would look around and maybe see a high point where the dog could view the situation. Like one catch we collected was from the top of an old soft log that overlooked his attraction. He made a totally blind set there. No scent, no visible sign of a trap. That is where he caught his sheep killer. Or if there was an obvious approach, he would look for a way in that you would not expect.

Of course he was needing to catch the bad dogs. But might as well set for the bad ones. If you do, just remember:
The back door, Lance. The back door.