Best bait for Foxes

[sunnychooks]

We've had two fox attacks in 3 days. My chickens are now confined to the chicken yard until we can catch the fox (probably foxes). We want to try to trap them first. What is the best bait to use in a "havahart-type" trap?

 

[arlee453]

a chicken??

Seriously, raw chicken might do the trick!

 

[Cuban Longtails]

aww... Arlee beat me to it!

Canned catfood might work too.

 

[panner123]

A live mouse. You can put it in a small metal cage tobe sure it dosen't get out. You can buy them at the pet store.

 

[lacyloo]

i have a trail game camera and i put out corn and smeared apple butter on top of it and had a fox come up and give me some good pics but i dont have them no more .....

thanks to the computer

 

[foxtrapper]

Good luck at getting a fox into a cage trap.

To make it work, you've got to make it not look like a cage. Cover the floor so the fox won't feel the wires. Cover the sides and top so it hopefully won't realize it's a cage. Make sure the door can still trigger when you do this!

You need one heck of a bait to convince a fox to enter a space. A live chicken in the back is going to be your best bet. Place the chicken behind wire mesh if you want it to possibly live. Tie it in place if you don't care if it dies. You need the fox to spend some time back there to hopefully step on the trigger and close the door.

Do *NOT* transport a live fox!

 

[snugglepup]

Has anyone tried snares? I don't know anything about trapping, but I wondered about these. Sounds like its tough to catch a fox in a live trap. And I doubt I can get someone to sit out all night to shoot him.

 

[foxtrapper]

Oh, it's pretty easy to live catch a fox, just darn hard to cage trap a fox.

A snare works well. You've got to place it in a path where the fox will stick its head through the noose. Generally that's not easy for people to figure out. If you've got a place in a fence where the fox always comes through, that's a dandy place for snare.

The foothold trap is the most effective at fox catching. The trick is to get the fox to place its paw just so, so it can be caught. Effectively, you're flipping a quarter out onto a field and getting a fox to step on it.

Steph wrote up a nice description of how to use a hay or straw set on the older board. You can find it here. http://p098.ezboard.com/fbackyardchickensfrm7.showMessage?topicID=1216.topic

This is probably the easiest set for a novice to use. Just keep the straw on the jaws to a minimum so the jaws can grasp the paw well.

Keep your dogs out of that set! A trap doesn't care what it catches.

 

[skatcatla]

"Construct net wire fences with openings of 3 inches (8 cm) or less to exclude red foxes. Bury the bottom of the fence 1 to 2 feet (0.3 m to 0.9 m) with an apron of net wire extending at least 12 inches (30 cm) outward from the bottom. A top or roof of net wire may also be necessary to exclude all foxes, since some will readily climb a fence. A 3-wire electric fence with wires spaced 6 inches, 12 inches, and 18 inches (15 cm, 31 cm, and 46 cm) above the ground can repel red foxes. Combination fences that incorporate net and electric wires are also effective."

I just posted that on the other fox trap thread as well.

 

[silver-quail]

I just sat in my truck and waited I got 2