An animal on scenting the bait will reach into the trap--the top of the pen having been carefully covered over--between the logs. When the animal seizes the bait the long trigger is pulled off of the upright prop and down comes the fall, killing the animal by its weight. Skunk, coon, opossum, mink, and in fact nearly all kinds of animals are easily caught in this trap. The fox is an exception, as it is rather hard to catch them in deadfalls.
THE POLE DEADFALL.
The more care you take to build the pen tight and strong the less liable is some animal to tear it down and get the bait from the outside; also if you will cover the pen with leaves, grass, sticks, etc., animals will not be so shy of the trap. The triggers are very simple, the long one being placed on top of the upright, or short one. The long trigger should have a short prong left or a nail driven in it to prevent the game from getting the bait off too easy. If you find it hard to get saplings the right size for a fall, and are too light, they can be weighted with a pole laid on the "fall."
The most successful trapper uses some deadfalls as well as steel traps, especially if trapping for a season at one place. If trapping season after season in the same locality deadfalls are a great help for mink that are apparently hard to catch in steel traps readily take bait from deadfalls and get caught. On the other hand, mink that refuse to take bait from deadfalls are often caught in blind steel trap sets.
The experienced trapper knows that mink travel along creeks, rivers, swamps, ponds and lakes. Care should be taken in selecting places to build deadfalls. If there are dens this is a good place to construct them. If there are many dens so much the better, but one is all that is required, for a mink is apt to investigate all and will scent bait. If you are acquainted with the territory you must know some places where mink frequent. It seems that the nature and habits of mink are such that although a mink had never traveled that territory before it would follow about the same course as others, as tracks in the mud and snow showed.
To prove this I will mention that some years ago in one deadfall I caught eight mink in five winters and one in a steel trap, making nine caught in the five years. This deadfall was built on the bank of a small stream some 20 feet from the water and near a large sycamore, under which there was a den, although the trap was some feet from the entrance to the den.
The first winter one mink was taken; the second two; the third three; the fourth two; the fifth one.
The fourth winter a few weeks after catching one in the deadfall the trap was down and the bait gone. The trap was rebaited, but for several trips I found the trap down and bait eaten. I felt sure that it was a mink, and although I set the triggers easy--I was using the two piece trigger and upright spindle--the animal continued to get the bait.