Do any of you all trap possums specifically, or just take them as they walk into your sets for other animals? When I first started trapping about 30 some years ago, I set alot of traps just for possums, around dumps and in persimmon groves, ect. But back then they were bringing 3 bucks each, in the round or skinned. Never bothered to flesh or stretch them. But 10 or 15 possums a day sure went a long way toward paying the gasoline bill....and if you do trap for them, what kinds of sets do you use and what bait?

I remember always having to catch every possum in the area before I started catching the targeted animals the red and grey fox. However your right those $3.00 added up. Also I learned how to skin by doing numerous possums too. If I start to lay legholds again. I think I will keep them. Also I would like to tan one. You get one when they are prime and the fur is real nice.


Mongojo thanks for the flashback. One thing for sure I would rather have a possum in the trap instead of a skunk. However the skunks are paying well to but I just did not want to lug it home and skin it and with the slip of the the knife the wrong way the basement surely would smell like a trading post.


I will have to check to see what the yare paying for them now. Oh let see I have Fur Fish & Game right here. March 2008 to be specific! Possums moved at $3.00 -$4.00 for the big heavy Northern bu smaller sizes and lower grades moved at residual prices.


However now get this? Stripped Skunk, Civet, Ringtail Cat all topped at $10-$12 for the very best skins. But striped skunk with less then complete stripes sold cheaply.

LOL..... I tried just turning the possums all loose one season...but it seemed like I just had 3 times as many the next year...so I started keeping them again...if just to thin them out, if for no other reason..... I've skinned a few skunks, particularly when I first started trapping...but finally just quit... They were only bringing about 2 or 3 bucks skinned back then, and it just wasn't worth it to me. So, I started just tossing them over away from the set..... Well, then I took a job working with a fella who's father was a fur buyer. I was talking to him one day at work about the skunks...and he told me that if I'd just bring the skunks to work, and toss them into the back of his pick-up, he'd give me a buck each for them...so that's what I started doing...and I did this for several years. Even after I quit working there I'd stop by on the way from running my lines and toss any skunks I had in the back of his truck... I sold most of my furs to his father anyway, so they would just catch me up on the skunks when I stopped in to sell furs......... After his father, the fur buyer, passed away, I quit messing with the skunks again.

Speaking of Grinners! I read that a lot of baby rabbits are killed by possums. It's so important the trappers do take a considerable amount of possum's since the rabbit populations are getting lower and lower and lower here in Pa and probably everywhere.