What
You Thought You Knew!
Article from Nov
- Dec 2008 Buckeye Trapper
by Nick
Bower
Sometimes I seem, as I’m sure you do, to get into a rut
in the way I think or go about doing something. The old adage,
“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” kind
of attitude. I guess now that I look back, I was fortunate to
be taught to think outside the box – to push the limits,
so to speak. Always ask yourself, “Is there a better way?”
Do I need to adjust on something? Can I do it faster with the
same results?
Where am I going with this you ask? I recall some years back,
well okay, several years back, picking up a book written by Stanley
Hawbaker on fox trapping. Wow! The Holy Grail, so to speak. Here
it was, in plain language, with pictures no less. It went on to
explain just exactly how to make a set that would catch a fox.
So, now we are fox trappers. We used the methods in the book and
they worked for us, so hmm, why in the world would I want to change
anything. That would be stupid on my part to deviate from the
methods that had actually worked, right?
Some of the things I know have been learned the hard way, by spending
countless hours in the field observing the target animals, making
some really dumb mistakes and then standing there and scratching
my head in disbelief. I have said many times that I’ve learned
a lot more from misses at a set rather than at a catch. You have
to learn to see what you’re looking at. During a conversation
at a convention this past summer, the talk was about what we know
– or think we know. I made the statement that I always thought
of myself as a trapper, but lately I’ve changed my way of
thinking and now I find myself being more of an animal psychologist.
I say to myself, now why in the world did that critter do what
it did? And I do my best to analyze the situation.
I’m not pitching anything here, but I must say the new videos
that have come out of late, the “Teachers of the Night,”
are what I would consider ground breaking and exciting. Oh, and
I might add they can humble you quickly. These videos show the
animal in its true environment, exactly how they react to a given
situation. And trust me, they are a real eye opener. It’s
funny to me in a way. I often ask myself, are the animals really
that much different than we are? It’s up to us to interpret
the animals’ behavior and devise a method to work to our
advantage.
I’ll end this brief article with this. Always think things
through, use your head, and listen to the animals; they will tell
you what to do. And never be afraid to think outside the box.###
Nick Bower, PO Box 181, New Athens, Ohio 43981.
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