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Post by bballou on Feb 8, 2013 21:42:37 GMT -5
Jim ------Paul Grimshaw---gave a demo back in the 70's with almost the same set as Ken Smyte---- Jim -----the set is real simple-----for the clogs in the water and on the banks ----the tooth-pick lure is the key.-----nothing smart or dumb about it------- I think the other Key is water not over 6 inches. ( much deeper and you will have a lot of misses.) Mink will destroy the clogs looking for the lure. They seam to enter the clog the same place each time.
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Post by oldtimer on Feb 8, 2013 22:26:44 GMT -5
bill/austin jim alady named hotchkiss, majila caught over 300 mink wile driving her husband and ed strong on atrap line from elmira ny to ithaca and down to waverly ny and back to elmira. droped of men and picked them up across miles of back country rds. all the wile setting traps for mink. all about 1947 or48 . my fur buyer told me the story wile i helped flesh a pile of green coon. he was ed strong the other partiner.
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Post by arrow1 on Feb 8, 2013 22:41:31 GMT -5
Let me say this. Back in my college days in New England I would travel to the NH Trappers Association "Trapper for a Day" program where you ran a line with one of the members with a professional. Paul Grimshaw was there one year and he showed me how to "read the Water". I once demonstrated this to a newbie while trapping muskrats...I set a #110 in a 15ft. wide stream with confidence that I would have a mink or rat the next day. He laughed how could you catch one in the wide open with no fencing or anything....Paul showed me how. Also got some pointers a couple other years from some other northeast well knowns like Harry Seekins (?), Bob Noonan, Bill Bailey. Man what memories from those days and where I learned a lot on the line for if I remember correctly $30.00 for the day. AustinP shows a very similar style in his DVD and picks up bonus mink out in the current flow.
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Post by spur on Feb 9, 2013 8:27:25 GMT -5
oldtimer you talking about ed strong that lived in horseheads by turk's ? he told me once he cautght 79 mink in a month and hotchkess had over 100 fox . they were trapping together at the time. i don't know what year though.
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Post by bballou on Feb 9, 2013 11:00:40 GMT -5
Oldtimer-----now that you jogged my memory-----I belive Paul Grimshaw told me that story of the lady who cough so many mink whale taking her husband and his partner around on there trap line. ------dont remember the year----I know a young lady who cough over 150 mink on her own--- a few years back.----YA CANT COUNT OUT THE LADYS. they will surpeise YA.
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Post by jsevering on Feb 11, 2013 7:38:12 GMT -5
have you guys ever read some of the radio tag studies on mink and fish... pretty interesting... in regards to seasonal habitats, time in water, even dives, dive depths and lengths of the dives in some of them... also actual amount of time percentage in water... not the riparian habitat... but the time in water...
always felt the southern zone seasons here miss the majority of the early dispersal for mink... some of those studies, pretty much help show or explain it some a hair better... jim
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Post by bballou on Feb 11, 2013 8:40:10 GMT -5
Jim ----please "PM" me the places I might get a copy of them studys ----- I would like to read them.
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Post by jsevering on Feb 11, 2013 11:35:12 GMT -5
bill ... type in
MINK PREDATION ON RADIO-TAGGED TROUT DURING WINTER IN A LOW-GRADIENT REACH OF A MOUNTAIN STREAM, WYOMING
then hit search... should be the first one that pops up... cant get the link to copy and paste.... for me... the other ones should open... jim
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Post by bballou on Feb 11, 2013 22:21:28 GMT -5
THANK YOU-----SURE HAS BEEN A LOT WRITTEN ABOUT THE LITTLE BUGGERS ------ you would think they would be whipped out ---instead of increasing in numbers.
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Post by deepsleep on Feb 11, 2013 22:38:51 GMT -5
I could not open it. Wish it would sounds interesting.
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Post by jsevering on Feb 12, 2013 7:02:31 GMT -5
i tried to copy and paste the link again... for some reason the addy wont paste right for me... did you try typing it in the title and hitting search in your search bar... should be able to get there that way..... here's one that might open for you that's fairly interesting, different than the tag trout study... some of those different fish tag recovery writing's are pretty interesting also... in regard to habitat, holing up and resting areas... jim www.icarus.es/product_document/url/54/Diurnal_activity....pdf
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Post by bballou on Feb 12, 2013 7:58:45 GMT -5
Thank you ---Jim---I have had no problem getting into anything you have given me the address to -----and let me tell you that dont happen often----computers and I dont get along.
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Post by snoeblind on Feb 12, 2013 8:40:13 GMT -5
This is a great thread. Both studies were interesting. I had at least 3 mink visiting my pond this fall. Watched them working one outside edge that has heavy cover, all 3 would swim and dive. Would see them dry and sun themselves on a fallen willow tree that reaches out into the pond. All activity that I witnessed was mid to late morning. Funny thing is I've lived here for 13 years and other than tracks in winter this is the first time I have actually seen them at the pond. It was a great learning experience as I often could get within 15 feet without them noticing I was there. I think the studies shed some light on behavior but I think mink are very individualistic and behavior is dictated on the environment that you are trapping in. Bottom edge sets work for me in shallower water and when rat trapping I will cover some runs top and bottom. Some years half my mink catch is in swamps covering those runs from top to bottom with most being caught on the top. Do not consider myself a very good minker but as I started doing more rat trapping years ago I was very surprised by the number of mink one could catch in small swamps that held relatively small numbers of rats.
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Post by deepsleep on Feb 12, 2013 13:08:32 GMT -5
Jim that one workd fine. interesting read. Still unable to open the other. Typed it exactly as you wrote it, it comes up in the search but files will not open.
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Woj
#3 Newhouse
Posts: 3,381
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Post by Woj on Feb 12, 2013 13:58:55 GMT -5
Try this attachment for the article Jim mentioned Also here is the link: goo.gl/rwiAuAttachments:
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Post by jsevering on Feb 13, 2013 8:09:52 GMT -5
thanks woj... ............................................................................................................ I think the studies shed some light on behavior but I think mink are very individualistic and behavior is dictated on the environment that you are trapping in. ..............................................................................................................
think your right snoeblind... those studies are just a glimpse in time most of the time, at a particular point or period in it... or at least what a lot of us probably choose to focus on within them right or wrong.... bill reminds me of that all the time, not only with mink unfortunately ... chappy made a comment on how the habitat and environment changes constantly earlier in the thread also... good to understand different behaviors and habitats... but like arrow 1 commented you still have to be able to read it or be able to visualize or see it happening, think with mink at times more than others... reading the stream and or habitat is especially important....
i dont know... what i do know is there sure is more mink trappers out there on this board than just the ones posting... be interesting to get some different thoughts... jim
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Post by jdpaint on Feb 13, 2013 19:10:56 GMT -5
What is the tooth pick lure the mink search for ?The few mink that i have seen have all been on the bank except one swimming like a dolphin down stream ,must have great under water vision?
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Post by mole on Feb 13, 2013 19:25:30 GMT -5
I have always said that a mink is what he wants to be. He can be as much as a water animal as any water animals and or as much a land animal as any land animal. Food, enviroment dictates to the mink what it has to do to survive there.
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Post by chappy on Feb 14, 2013 12:05:53 GMT -5
He doesn't know he's small.......hmmmm.....
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Post by bballou on Feb 14, 2013 19:20:47 GMT -5
ED --I belive Bill Nelson was saying the same thing in his mink book as you said----they are where you find them ----and each one has its own personality. ----I rely belive if you want to catch very many ---- you have to be ready to change what you are doing at any time during your day on the line.
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Post by mole on Feb 15, 2013 4:38:18 GMT -5
A lot of mink are caught in a different sets, running poles, dirt holes, etc. and then written off as incidentals , I dont really think they are that incidental.
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Post by jsevering on Feb 15, 2013 6:43:27 GMT -5
i dont know too much about there eyesite, jd... i always figured they had good eyesite myself... but most everything i ever read about it claims its only fair... how they know, i dont know... they say mink dont have the second lens like an otter for eye protection, for foraging underwater, imagine that counts some with light refraction, water depth, how thick any ice is and all also... guess you would need a biologist to explain the difference between good and fair... i sure dont know... jim
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Post by bballou on Feb 15, 2013 19:44:53 GMT -5
ED---I.M.O. the word (incidentals) should be stricken from trappers vocabulary-----I dont know about the rest of you trappers -----BUT I DONT CATCH ----"INCIDENTALS" when I trap --- I -am trying to catch all the furbearers that the season is open for----when I set a (so to speak) a beaver trap I am usually trying for beaver -- otter---muskrat and mink---an long as the season is open ----same goes for traps I set on land---a coyote set----is also for coon ---fox---fisher--- etc.----as long as the season is open----- I dont hear of trappers catching fisher in there coyote sets and letting them go free----unless the season isnt open--- --- we can go ---ON ---AND -----ON--- "I DONT THINK THE WORD FITS (MANY) of todays TRAPPERS.---Right now I cant think of a trapper that I know who catches -----INCIDENTALS.
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Post by chappy on Feb 15, 2013 21:03:03 GMT -5
I've met few of those trappers, where everything they catch is incidental....lol!
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oldeman
Fulton Montgomery Fur Harvesters Ass.
Posts: 581
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Post by oldeman on Feb 15, 2013 23:07:17 GMT -5
I have to agree with Mole on that one I think the mink is about the most adaptable critter we have.They seem to always find a way to survive.
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