traps, snares, and nets for food gathering

After the SHTF, it's too late to start thinking about alternate more effective means of taking game and fish for providing protien for the tribe.
.
Ultimately, self sustainable vegetable, fish, poultry, other meat, milk, and eggs, are whats needed to survive healthy, wealthy and wise...
.
simple knowledge of how to manufacture a figure four wooden deadfall trigger and hunting is not enough.

 

Sorry computer link was acting hinky and I quickly posted instead of losing it and having to retype all.
.
I have a more than adequate supply of various sized snares, and materials to make at least a hundred more of the big ones. I have steel leg traps and small body crusher traps. I have gill nets properly stored for long term storage with little or no degrading.
.
I have books on net making and use. Books and dvd videos on trapping and use of snares.
.
An excellent book I can recommend for all would be "Survival Poaching" by Ragnar Benson. Additionally a subscription for one year to "Fur Fish and Game" magazine is an excellent source for info and additional books and supplies.
.
Hunting or fishing is just not near as an effective use of your time to provde meat or fish when your life and that of your loved ones is on the line.
.
IMHO this is something you all need to think about.

 

A simple milkjug,2 feet of line,and a large hook work well for turtles and catfish.

 

Agree, If there's any game left hunting ceases to be "sport" at that point. So all that stuff that's illegal in the state hunting license pamphlets become a "how to". better to stock those hens and rabbits in the backyard... ( uses less of your energy
and ups the odds of eating.) shopping list for this years energy/sustainability fair includes books on backyard poultry and building coups.

 

Actually for these, bush hooks (bank lines), trot lines, and fixed semi submerged turtle traps are more effective with less time and effort. But to each his own. What works well for one might not for another in all cases.

 

Well just remember, if teotwawki happens, it'll be back to nature. Food, protection and sex. Just like the other animals now.

 

One problem I see in the suburbs is that any trap I set and catch is likely to be seen by somebody else. They'll either take the animal for food, let it go because they wouldn't know what to do with it, or they'll be those environmental freaks that release my catch to the wild (and probably still do that even of it's dead).

When possible, I really need to find a nice community of people with lots of open land around us so that we could sustain ourselves without necessarily stepping on each others toes (or traps!). This suburb situation we are in is going to complicate things. Will be MUCH competition for limited resources (food, water) with zombies walking around looking for a handout of my hard day's work.

 

Can a gill net be set out and left, or do you have to pull it or put across a flowing stream to harvest?

 

The scenero on this was after the SHTF. In that situation, anyone screwing with my traps, nets, or anything else for gathering food for my tribe, has just signed their death warrant!

 

Isn't it currently illegal in most states to use traps?

 

Seafood can die and get ripe quickly when caught and immobilized. Gill nets should be checked 2 to 3 times minimum daily. In some scenerios they are strung to intercept fish moving with the current, or spooked and herded with splashing and or banging rocks together, and then the net is pulled minutes after setting. I have in the past taken a load of mullet this way.

 

cool thanks guys, that clears up much.

 

Radically varies state by state, even possession in some cases, mine are well stashed. This is for a post SHTF situation.

 

This thread reminds me, I need to get a couple good cast nets. Dad taught me to use one, for catching baitfish and shrimp.

We used a 400 yard seine net from his mullet boat, before they brought down the net ban several years back. There was a legal size the mesh had to be, to allow juvenile fish through to continue to grow. BUT..... too many coastal bubbas used smaller mesh, ran the small fish out of the grass with airboats and caught EVERYTHING. THAT is why our fishing stocks plummetted, requiring the Goobermint to make the net ban to preserve what was left. Put a lot of friends and family out of the fishing business.

We used trot lines for catfish on the river too. Had to check them fairly frequently, else the snapper turtles got the fish.

I have been noticing how my Suburban Squirrels use my privacy fence as a highway.... Several places the verticals have a space the squirrel runs through - PERFECT place for some wire snares!