To Catch A Predator

[Hillschicks]

Found these guys this morning... Girls i guess would be more accurate... We built our coop inside of an old barn... One of the only ways for animals to get in and out of the barn is through an opening i left for the chicken to come and go... We put a live trap right up againts the opening every night so the animals trying to come in find the easiest way to be thru the trap.. No bait or anything...

Then over in the corner by the actual coop we set a second live trap with bait as a second line of defense... The hope is they come for the chickens and before they break into the coop they stop for the quick easy meal by the door...

Chicken survival today 100% ... Coon survival today 0% ... So far so good

 

[heronz]

Great catch.

 

[blucoondawg]

You should skin them and barbeque them, coon is quite tasty!!!

 

[slap]

^Do they taste like chicken?

 

[sourland]

^Do they taste like chicken?

Not the ones that I have eaten.

Need to get blucoondawg's recipe.

Well done on eliminating the problem.

 

[blucoondawg]

There is nothing gross at all about eating racoon, people think that for some reason but they are a wild game animal like anything else. I think it is because folks have the idea that they are garbage eaters since the old days when you would see them in the dumps but that is not true, sure they may get into your garbage and eat leftover food or something out of it but in rural areas like mine coon live on corn in the farm areas and acorns in the wooded areas along with shellfish and whatever out of streams. Nothing gross about it at all, you just have to know how to cook them, people eat possum too but that would be on the edge for me, possums gross me out for some reason.

 

[Hillschicks]

Hey, anyone who lives in the thumb area of michigan is more than welcome to come pick up any coons i catch, i'd even leave them alive in the trap so they stay fresh... But me, not so much with the eating coons... I grew up on a small farm, they are just seen as a irritant... Like squirrels and possum... Had a squirrel around here liked to chew threw fluid lines in our cars... Key word had lol... Where i come from ya see a coon, ya shoot a coon, ya throw a piece of baler twine around them and drag em off into the woods.. Let the coyotes have em

 

[chickengeorgeto]

As with all things if you want to eat a coon start with the way you dress or butcher the coon. Coons have 4 glands or kernels one under or in each arm pit. All 4 of these glands must be removed or else your bar-b-qued coon will taste more like dirty wet wool smells.

bon appetite.

 

[blucoondawg]

That is true George, also they need to be par boiled to get the fat off or they will not taste good, but if cleaned properly they are very good.

 

[sourland]

Glands we removed, par boil we did not - smelled rank and tasted worse! Woodchuck, squirrel, muskrat, cottontail - all good. Never tried opossum - trapped and killed too many as a kid - don't like that 'sickly sweet' smell of them plus we know what they eat.