Eric and I taking Trapper's Education

This last Friday and Saturday Eric and I took the Wisconsin Trapper's Education course at the Brill Area Sportsman's Club.  The course was only $12 so I figured why the hell not, and Eric decided to sign up too.  For the $12 we got a trapping license, a subscription to two trapping magazines, and lunch.  For that price you just can't go wrong.  I decided to make a trip of it since I got the time off from work and go camping for the class.  So, I stayed at the Waldo Carlson Park on Red Cedar Lake.  I took my brother's 2 man tent since I wanted to pack light.  I brought a sterno can like thing for heat to cook my food in case I didn't have a fire ring, because I didn't know anything about the campground.  It's a good thing I did too the campground was somehow actually worse than just camping in the woods.  There were some RV spots that were level, but other than that the campground was on a hill and did not have much space per campsite.  I was stuck on the side of a hill within a few feet of the road to get into the campground.  It was a horrible place and didn't even have a fire ring.  It was not enjoyable sleeping on the side of hill and even worse being so close to a road you could feel and hear every vehicle that went by.  The showers at campground cost $1 for 5 minutes which is expensive as far as pay showers go.  The campground was packed and I know it wasn't for the campground, so it must have been the lake.  Either way I did not enjoy my time there and if got the chance would for sure not go back.

Trappers Education was long, but fun and full of interesting things I learned.  The first night of the class was all ethics, laws and bookwork.  The second day was the fun one though.  Eric and I learned how to set every different kind of trap we could think of and different sets to make for catching animals.  It was fun, because it was all hands on and full of fun.  I even learned how to put animals up for sale.  The instructors for the class were so knowledgeable it was almost beyond belief.  I had some really quality instructors.  They got me excited to go trapping and I hope I can find some cheap traps and get trapping.  The one complaint I had is I hoped they would have a list they could give us of all the local fur buyers in the area with contact information.  The stressed each person traps a different way, and the way to learn how to trap is to get out and do it, so hopefully I will do just that.  Hopefully The Brill Area Sportsman's Clubhouse is really nice and even has AC!  Their trap and skeet range is also nice even having lights for night on it.  Their shooting range was a little less nice but still acceptable.  What really surprised me though was the fact that dues were only $20 a year for such a nice facility.  Anyway here are a few pictures of my camping experience and trapper's education.

A man's meal Beanie Weanies

My cooking setup

My campsite.  See how bad it is.

The skinning and fleshing station

What to have with you while trapping

Look at all the different kinds of traps

Spaghetti and meatballs

My campsite again

The sweet patch I got for graduating

Quad Survival's camping trip aka Ryan's tent shakedown

A few weeks ago Eric, Ryan, and I (Jared) went on a two night, wait O.K. two nights for me one night for Ryan and Eric camping trip on the Namekagon river at the Earl Landing.  I have camped at the earl landing quite a bit and I typically enjoy the experience.  In fact I had already camped there once this Summer.  The Earl landing has free campsites with a fire ring and picnic table and has a 3 night limit per spot on camping.  You can go to the landing and sign up ahead of time for a campsite if you want on a sheet of paper and so far I've had no trouble with people in my camp site I have signed up for (I hope that continues).

The main reason we went camping on this trip is that I had a few days off in a row, Eric really wanted to go camping, and Ryan got a new tent and wanted to try it out.  We ended up picking this location after talking Eric out of some crazy location where none of us could carry our gear to or something like that.  Anyway we got to the camp site early in the morning and set up our tents.  I put in my two crayfish traps and Eric put in his new minnow trap.  Eric and Ryan then decided to go fishing and I went tubing with my friends down the river.  I don't know what they did while I was gone so I can't write to much about it.  I got back from tubing and checked my crayfish traps and low and behold I caught a shiner minnow.  Not really what I wanted to catch so I let him go.  Eric and Ryan did a little bit more fishing and Eric came back with some smallmouth bass.  One of them was pretty nice as you can see in the picture.  Anyway, as true men Eric filleted the bass and we had a good old fashioned fish fry.  Eric added to the fish fry though some venison nuggets fried up which were amazing and the best food on the trip.  After that we decided to sit around the fit and I guess just talk.  Eric and Ryan decided they would have a long night discussing intellectual things.  I think they went to bed around 3 A.M.

The next day was rough for Ryan and Eric.  I checked my crayfish traps and caught a little turtle and let him go.  I spent most of the day convincing Eric and Ryan to stay another night, but they had enough camping for one day or something.  By afternoon I got Eric and Ryan going and we went to Hayward saw some sweet cars visited a friend, but that doesn't have to do with the outdoors.  We had venison nuggets again and I tried to convince Eric and Ryan to stay another night again, but they would have none of it and started packing up.  Just as they started packing up I turned on my weather radio and there was a storm coming in something like 5 minutes.  I informed Eric and Ryan and then went to my car and checked on my phone to confirm indeed a thunderstorm was coming.  Eric and Ryan decided to keep taking down their stuff anyway and ended up getting stuck in the storm.  Since my tent was the only one left up they all dove in it for the duration of the storm.  After it ended Eric and Ryan packed up and left.  I went to Spooner, got some food, went back to the tent, and spent the night in there sleeping with storms off and on.  In the morning I pulled my crayfish traps and they were empty.  I'm beginning to think crayfish don't exist anymore.  I then picked up my campsite and went to work.  That was the end of the camping trip.

The camping trip was pretty fun and the view from out campsite was as always beautiful.  Free camping and beautiful views reminds me of why I love Wisconsin.  Within the next few days I'll put up a blog post of Eric and I's next adventure which we did this last weekend.  Look for that soon until then here are pictures of our camping trip below.

My Tent

Ryan's new tent

Eric's overpriced hippie REI tent haha

The campsite

Eric and Ryan Fishing

Rough Morning

Breakfast

The boring way to start a fire

Being caught in a storm

My tent survived the storm and is the last tent set up

Campsite

Sitting around the fire

Sitting in the river

Ryan dressed quite interesting in front of his tent

caught inside due to the storm

The view of the river

Sitting in the river again

The bass Eric caught

End of camping burn everything fire

Eric making din din