Hobbies And Interests
Bait
The grey fox is an omnivore that hunts small mammals, bird eggs, birds and other types of small animals such as rodents. It also eats insects, fruits, nuts, berries, grain and carrion. Because of their diverse diet, finding the ideal bait is not difficult. Grey foxes are particularly attracted to meaty foods that have a rich, particularly easy to detect smell. These include bacon, bloody beef, lard, fried lard, chicken and almost any sort of slightly spoiled meat. In addition to using bait in the traps, use a commercially prepared liquid scent, which is mixed specifically to attract grey foxes. It can be purchased at hunting or trapping supply stores.
Preparing Trapping Equipment
Before any kind of trap is used to hunt grey fox, it has to be specially prepared. The first step includes soaking and washing the trap in vinegar for a couple of days to get rid of residual oils from the manufacturing process. After that, any trap should be left out in the open and exposed to the weather for a few more days in order to get it rusty. This process also completely remove residual human odors from it. A final step consists of boiling trapping materials in water that contains pieces of bark from a tree in the animal's habitat for about 30 minutes. Once any trap equipment is prepped through this process, it should never again be touched by bare human hands or come into contact with human odors. The best solution is to store it in a clean, air-tight container outdoors.
Types of Traps
The most commonly used grey fox trapping equipment consists of coil-spring traps, cage traps and snare cables. Grey foxes are small animals with small legs, so its usually enough to use a 1.5-coil-spring trap on them. This means that the trap has an open-jaw diameter of just under 5 inches. In order to avoid hurting the fox, coil springs with rubber coated jaws are recommended. Snare cable should be anywhere from 1/16 inch to 3/32 inch gauge and is very convenient for use along game trails and in burrow entrances. Cage traps are usually only useful for young, inexperienced foxes, but they are good to have as part of the equipment anyways.
Trap Placement
Coil traps should be set along game trails, at the entrances to open clearings and close to any dead animals that are rotting in the grey fox's habitat. Another idea is to dig a small burrow in which grey fox bait or scent is placed. Right in front of its entrance, conceal a coil trap by placing it in a shallow depression in the soil and cover its spring pad with wax paper. This protects it from jamming after you have sifted dirt over the trap to conceal it. This style of concealment can be used any time a coil trap is set. Snares should be set up along trails that grey foxes use to reach carcasses or prey, in den entrances and in gaps in fencing or rocks where the foxes will pass through. It is a good idea to examine the contours of the landscape in order to get a feel for where the foxes are likely to travel.