cheap (FREE!) live possum trap

[JenellYB]

No kidding, I'm serious, I've got rid of a LOT of possums with this, one time THREE possums at once!

Use a tall garbage can with good tight lid. Remove lid, lay garbage can on its side just outside a handy door....your back door, whatever...and somewhere with a window or door slightly open (screened!) so you can hear sounds out there.
Begin putting kitchen scraps in it in the evenings. Yes, start FEEDING the possums in it.
Once you know you've got some possums enjiying their regular evening smorgsborg, set the can upright, still very near the door, propped up with something like other cans or boxes, both to keep it standing, AND to provide easy access to your dinner guests.

Keep a listen while you do your kitchen duties, watch tv, whatever. The possums falling down into the can, thump, and then the scrtachign around to get back out, and sometimers hissing and growling if there are more than one of them, as usually pretty noticable. Don't jump up and run out the first time you hear it. Let them get comfortable about the new upright can situation. Then, after a couple nights of that, just step out and place the lid on the can, snap it on, and either haul them off a long ways in the morning, preferably across a couple major rivers, and not into someone else's back yard, to release them, or if you prefer, open the can in daylight and club them or whatever.
And oh, yeah, if you happen to live on the east side of the Trinity river down here in Liberty county, please don't bring them over here to the west side of the river to dump them out! I had quite enough of them before I brought them over there to you!

 

[Bear Foot Farm]

Quote: Im most states, that's illegal

If you're not going to kill them, don't bother to trap them.

 

[JenellYB]

I've killed most of them, once I figured out an effective way of doing so. The hardest was the three at once. Those I had someone with a gun shoot them...I don't have a gun....ruined a perfectly good garbage can with holes, though. Actually, the area I have hauled them to is very very remote, densely thicketed swampland, and without nearby human habitation, in a very large river bottom. And i actually don't think it's illegal here in Texas. Animal pest control companies an even game officials routinely 'rehome' such wildlife into such areas, and national forest land here.
And yes, kill them or haul them, there's good reason to bother trapping them. We were at those times in this neighborhood absolutely over run with them, and they are very nasty and destructive. One could easily have set my home on fire...it crawled up through the dryer vent hose that opens under the back porch, and actually built it's nest of dried grass and leaves in the space beneath my dryer tumbler. I was lucky to realize it before the hot dryer ignited that stuff.

 

[nzpouter]

drill a hole on the lid and you can turn it into a CO2 chamber....

 

[Darin115]

Place the lid on the garbage can and leave a small crack. Spray about haf a bottle of starting fluid in the can and place the lid back on tight. Wait a while and go dump the dead critter.

Extremely effective and no hole in the can.

Darin

 

[JenellYB]

Whatever means one prefers does dealing with the things once you've trapped them, considering the cost of those live animal traps, that one may only use once or a few times, this garbage can trap is cheap, and I've definitely had excellent sucess with it.

A similar trap technique I had discovered many years ago, trying to deal with a terrible rat infestation in a barn where horses and other livestock were kept, and rats so bad they'd even chew holes in the lids of feed storage containers to get to the feed, can be quite effective, as well. I'd fill a tall garbage can or even metal feed drum with water to within about a foot ot the top. Then 'float' a layer,, several inches thick, of whole oats on the surface. Place where rats have easy access to climbing up and dropping down into it. It you don't fill it high enough, that they couldn't easily jump back out if the can really were full of oats, they will hesitate to jump down in to begin with. but the layer of floating oats gives the illusion they will be landing on a solid bed of grain. But then, they will be unable to get traction to jump back out as they just sink into the water when they try to get out. and even a rat can't stay swimming forever.Never tried this trick with possums, but now thinking about it, it might work for them too.

 

[JenellYB]

btw, while i've had and used guns in the past, and am not adverse to them used responsibly and carefully, I have had for some years now a family member that cares for foster children, and those children are often in my home and I often babysit them. Under foster care regulations, that requires me as a supplemental care-giver, and my home must meet some of the regulations that apply to the primary foster care-gover home. And one of those regulations is that there are no firearms kept in the home.

I've been up against the same dilemma with a problem here with squirrels the last few years. I've about given up veggie gardening because once they discovered what a delightful smorsgasborg it is, it had become impossible to garden much. Everything from green beans, bell peppers, tomatoes, not to even think about cantaloupes....whoosh! Squirrels get it...amazing to watch a squirrel easily scamper up a tree with a tomato half as big as the squirrel, in its mouth! I'm trying a bit this year, planning to try to cover with wood frames and poultry netting.

 

[Darin115]

Buy yourself a hav-a-hart trap and catch the squirrels. Once in the trap dunk the trap in water. Leave it there a few minutes then pull out and discard the dead squirrel. Or place the trap in the trash can and spray starting fuild it there and shut the lid. Either way works great.

No gun necessary.

I had the varmits eating all my corn last Summer. I caught 8-10 in the trap and had no more problems.


Darin

 

[archerobx]

I have used a similiar trap in the past but slightly modified.

- Cut a peice of wood the same shape as the opening of the trash can just slightly smaller.
- nail the wood inside the can so the wood spins freely
- fill trash can 1/4 with water or weight it so live critter will not flip can
- bait with peanut butter or something sticky.
-


animal tries to get bait. climbs on wood then the wood spins sending animal to bottom of can. if water in can animal drowns

 

[JenellYB]

Darin,
you are probably right if I'm ever to have a garden again. I seem to have an endless supply of them, being surrounded by large tracts of timberland and thickets. I think if I could ever get rid of the ones personally "experienced" at seeing my garden as a ready food source, it might get a lot better. I gardened many years here before they seemed to discover that, and of course, once they did, every generation taught the next. Used to be, I didn't have a great big problem, they didn't even stay here on my property in large numbers. I have a couple acres cleared ground around me and a few big trees. they used to be kind of seasonable, just migrating out of surrounding woodlands where there are lot of pines, which i don't have, and they ate mostly the pine seeds, into my yard when a couple of big oaks had acorns and two big old pecan trees had pecans. After they'd clean those out, they'd go back to the woods, because i never put food out for them to encourage them. Thank goodness, I never had much problem with rabbits in my garden, or deer, for that we do have such a prolific predator population here, why right now I'm excited about my recently found 'bird cage bantam hen', if i can keep them indoors, protected without the major construction needed to have chickens outside, that might be fun. Also, i used to have a number of large outside dogs, don't anymore. My old fences aren't safe any more for my dogs to stay outside unattended, I live on a busy state highway. So they are mostly housedogs, out only for supervised walks. but dogs are great helpers, it was actually my dogs that told me something was living inside my clothes dryer on the back porch, maybe saving my house from being burned down! I'd have never thought to look for that otherwise.
The hav-a-hart traps....yes, might eventually break down and buy one, expensive as they are, but lots of things like that get put on a long wating list, now that I'm retired, disabled, have a very limited income. My physical limitations severely limit how much/big garden I could do now, anyway. I'm going to try to protect a few choice things this year, see how it goes.