Animal Traps
Small woodland creatures are not just for dancing and singing with Disney princess, they also make for a great meal.
When you are in a survival situation, the thing to remember is that you are going to have to lower your standards for meals. You have just dropped a few places on the food chain and if you cant come to grips with this, you are going to starve to death.
This is why you are going to have to catch, kill, clean and cook some creature that you might have been too good to consume before T.S.H.T.F.
Animals like raccoon, squirrels, rabbits, foxes, skunks, and possums might not seem appealing now, but once you start to get really hungry and your life depends on it, know that they are all highly edible and if cooked properly can also be delicious.
This leads us to the topic of how to catch these elusive creatures. You can try running after them throwing sticks, stones and curses at them, but thanks to their instinctive survival skills, you are probably not going to catch much. You are also going to waste a lot of valuable energy if you go this route.
A better option is to just set out some traps and go do something else for a little while. This will consume far less of the energy that you are going to need to live and also provide you with the sense of satisfaction in knowing that even though you are not the fastest or strongest thing in the forest, you still have the biggest brain.
Where To Place Snare Traps
If you have even walked along a field you may have noticed that there are rutted track all along it. These tracks are the trails that are made by the constant use of rabbits and other small animals. These are also found along the edges of forests. Bigger ones are also used by deer and other animals that you can take down if you have a large appetite or group of people to feed.
Sometimes you are going to have bad luck with your traps. If this is happening, you can always direct animal traffic towards your traps by blocking the other trails that are nearby. The Native Americans did this on a bassive scale and in one hunt were able to take down enough of a herd to feed their tribes in only one or two days.
How To Make A Simple Snare Trap
On my page about bug out bags, I suggest that you are going to want to add some wire into your bag. This is good stuff to pack because you can use it to make the simplest kind of snare trap.
A simple snare trap is just a loop of wire held up with two sticks that a small animal gets it head caught in. The animals instinct will be to pull away, but that will only make the trap tighter and lead to suffocation and you have got yourself a nice little meal.
How to make a Dead Fall Trap
The dead fall trap is one that has been used for thousands of years. It’s primary target is small animal like rodents, scorpions and other tiny critters that can be crushed by a falling rock. Making one is easy to learn, but having the patience to set up the hair trigger is something that takes a lot longer.
The dead fall trap or Paiute dead fall trap as it is commonly known is sometimes called the figure four trap. This is because the trigger mechanism can look like the number four.
I would suggest learning the art of using a knife before you attempt to make one of these because it takes some precise cutting and carving into the sticks that you are going to be using. If you already are skilled enough to use a knife without slicing your hand open then we are ready to proceed.
To make a dead fall trap you are going to need a few sticks and some twigs. I don’t think that I can properly explain it so I am going to find a video to post on here about how it is done. Please wait just one moment.
Here is a good video that show the figure four dead fall trap in action. It does not explain how it is made because all of those videos has some “expert” jabbering about all sorts of crap. Warning though, this video does show a chipmunk getting squashed. Its not for the faint of heart.
