Squirrel and mink trapping

November 1 - 4:

I had made a phone call to a fellow who works at a gas plant about a 30-minute drive from my trapline parking spot. I wanted to make sure of how much snow was in the area. Good thing I called, a foot had fallen over the previous two days. The snowmobile would now become my mode of transportation for the next five months.

Dakota and I headed up Thursday morning in a freezing rain at lower elevations. Highway 16 was a bit of an ice rink and what is normally traveled at 110 km/h was now traveled closer to 90 km/h. Once we hit the gravel roads and higher elevations, the rain turned to snow. Once we reached Boulder Road, the hoar frost was hanging heavy in the trees and the skies were grey. We watched two cow moose cross the road in front of us near Boulder Hill and I managed to get a couple of photos.

Two cow moose on Boulder Road. The powerline feeds an unmanned gas plant
just a couple of kilometres off my trapline.

One last look back before she took off and disappeared into the bush.

Once we arrived at our parking spot, I unloaded and then took my Tundra 550F down to the cabin and hooked up the sled. My sled can haul a lot of stuff and it has a musher on it so Dakota has somewhere to ride behind me. In one trip, I had everything we were going to need for four days at the cabin.

My contact had been right. We had nearly a foot of snow at lower elevations, more higher up. The cabin roof only had about 6-inches on it but I decided to remove it before the woodstove warmed it up to the point of melting, causing undue weight on the roof. The weather was mild and the forecast was calling for freezing rain at Whitecourt; we were hoping it would remain snow and not rain at the trapline.

The rudimentary snow remover works really well pulling snow from the cabin roof.

That afternoon, Dakota and I headed out to put up some mink traps at obvious locations along a few creeks that flow through the trapline. By day's end, we had seven sets up with duck or beaver meat as the bait. I was trying out Lennon's Mink Lure, hoping it would pull in a mink over the three short nights our traps would be up. Next week we would be deer hunting in WMU 510 at Baptiste Lake where I have a lake lot, so the traps would have to be closed before we left. I wouldn't be back until later in November when Dad and I would be running the marten line for a couple of weeks straight. Dad would be bringing up a pile of fish heads for bait then as well. We'll reset all the mink traps then with fish as the bait. With the mild weather we were having, I wasn't expecting a good catch this trip, but I had my fingers crossed anyway.

A mink set alongside a creek under a small bridge. A 120 Conibear is set inside the box.
If you look closely, you can see the trigger wires.

The next day, after checking empty mink sets, Dakota and I hit the trail and set up the snares on his snare poles. We had just finished setting them up at one midden on Clear Trail when a squirrel suddenly appeared, watching us as we had a snack and a juice box. Much to our surprise, the squirrel jumped up on one of Dakota's poles and went straight into a snare. We had our first squirrel just minutes after setting up our first midden and we watched the entire catch from start to finish. We then cut a tree that had fallen on Clear Trail and loaded the sled with the wood. It was good wood for the outside fire at the cabin and I didn't want to just leave it lying there on Clear Trail.

Dakota with his first squirrel. This one entered the snare almost immediately after we set it.

The next morning, my plan was to check all of our sets and then run the Pipeline Trail. I wanted to make a trail with the snowmobile, packing down a base for easier travel later on. I wanted to put a trap in each marten box so I wouldn't have to haul traps and bait when the marten sets go up later in the month. After checking empty mink traps once again, Dakota was happy to discover he'd caught two more squirrels at the same midden on Clear Trail he'd caught his first squirrel on.

Dakota with his first squirrel midden double.

We then headed up the Pipeline Trail. An early section of the trail is quite steep and I was concerned about how the Tundra would handle it with a load on behind. The weather was wreaking havoc with the snow, making it heavy and wet, slowing down the Tundra. The steep part of the Pipeline trail has three berms on it, in essence, man-made humps meant to keep vehicles (hunters) off the pipeline. Unfortunately, you can't hit the really steep part of the trail with any speed, as one of these berms is immediately in front of it. We spun out half way up and had to make a new plan, but first we had to turn the rig around on what is likely a 40% incline. After unhooking the sled, I managed to get the Tundra turned around without tipping it over and the sled hooked back up again. This was quite difficult because the sled had to be held back or it would have took off down the hill without us. The plan was to now run the Pipeline Trail from the opposite direction. I'm pretty sure though that with better snow conditions and a packed base, we'll be able to run the line the proper direction. At least, we'll try to when Dad arrives and we're running the line full swing. It takes about an hour and 15 minutes to run the entire Pipeline Trail by snowmobile, much longer by quad.

Dakota on the sled musher on an early part of the Pipeline Trail.

In the photo above, you can see part of the Pipeline Trail. The distant high point is where we need to go. After passing over that high point, the trail runs to the left about a mile and then comes all the way back on another pipeline, thus the name, Pipeline Trail. Along this route, I have about 15 marten sets and most likely, when tracks determine and once they are open, several lynx sets.

My plan was to run South Trail in the afternoon. I wanted to get traps in those marten boxes, check on South Trail Bridge and pack down the trail as well. As soon as we hit South Trail, we picked up on a pile of wolf tracks all heading southwest. This is where it gets interesting, as they were definitely hunting. Shortly after we picked up their trail, three wolves left the pack and headed directly east, two went straight south, and three stayed on South Trail, which at this point is actually running southwest before it too goes directly south. We now figured we had eight wolves in this pack. We followed the three wolves on South Trail for quite some distance. They had crossed South Trail Bridge (which is a little rickety and could use another log or two), before stopping and ripping up the ground, peeing all over the place and marking their territory.

Even though this front track is in a back one, you can still plainly see the front track, which is huge.
Compared to my hat, this is most likely the track of the alpha male or female.

We continued to follow the three wolves for about three kilometres when suddenly, two of the wolves that had separated from the pack, rejoined the three we were following. Then, a couple of hundred yards later, two wolves left the pack again and headed off down a cutline, once again leaving us three to follow. About another kilometre later, they returned to the pack and we were now following five wolves again, who were still marking their territory. A little while later, the three missing wolves returned and we had eight wolves again. South Trail turns back east for about a kilometre before turning back south again, at this point, we left the wolf pack trail.

My plan is to now watch this pack as closely as I can. I want to figure out how they operate before I can formulate a plan to try and catch some of them. Wolves are incredibly smart and difficult to catch, but if you can figure them out, your job gets a whole lot easier. Knowing where they are marking their territory is a good place to start.

Dakota on South Trail. By this time, we had left the wolf pack and were close to Broken Bridge Trail.
I decided to leave Broken Bridge Trail alone until colder weather guaranteed the bog would be frozen solid.

The next morning (Sunday) was our last before heading home. We'd accomplished a lot but had failed to catch a mink. We never set any weasel traps because they need to prime up a bit first, but they appear to be plentiful and were feasting on our mink bait. I'm surprised one didn't accidentally set off a trap and get caught, but weasels are quite slim and can bypass the trigger with ease. Weather also didn't help our cause, as both Friday and Saturday night saw rain, some of it freezing but for the most part, especially Saturday, wet rain. However, once again Dakota had another double at another squirrel midden on Unnamed Trail (I think that name is going to stick for that trail). He now has five squirrels and is well on his way to his goal of fifty.

Another double, this one on Unnamed Trail.

Until next time.