Fishing a Badger out of a hole.......

A

ackleyman

New member
Hey guys, I ran into a guy that was out catching rattle snakes (he did not look normal to me, either). He had this little trick of runnning a 12' piece of heater hose down a hole, listening for the growls, then putting in about 4 oz of gasoline in the hose that he carried in a cough medicine bottle. Then he blew 4 good lung fulls of breath down the length of pipe, and OUT THE SNAKES CAME!!!

I got to thinking that this would have to work on a badger. So, on my next trip to N. Nevada, I tried the same thing on a badger hole...dang, they do come out pissed! Once in a while, you will get a double, stay on your toes.

I have killed quite a few with this technique over the years
and thought that you guys might like to have a little fun. It will sure make your butt muscles pucker the first couple of times you do it!

One other thing, don't ever be surprised at what comes out of the hole. If you have several people with you at the time, have them all together on the same side of the hole, it is easy to shoot someone with bullets bouncing off rocks in the dirt. It is best to let one guy do the shooting, because folks do get excited, and once in a while you will run across a guy that has no control when he gets really pumped up.

Good luck!
 
You could probably do the same thing with something a whole lot less harmful to the environement. Pepper spray comes immediately to mind. I do however question the sanity of such a practice /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif.
 
I'm thinking it might be good just to remind people not to smoke while using this method. One just never knows...

/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif
 
Gasoline actually isn't that harmful to the environment since it evaporates. At least that's what they say about boat gas spills on the water which happens whenever I fill my tanks.

I've used the garden hose and gas method for catching rattlesnakes but I've never tried it for badgers. I used to flag a badger hole during the daytime and then go back and call it at night. I got my badger pins and trophy that way. BTW....You'd be surprised at the size of some of those rattlers that come out of a small ground squirrel hole. One thing you have to be careful of is that they often have more than one entrance. You can be pouring in the gas in one hole and the snake can be coming out of another that's covered with grass right by your legs.

Last week over in eastern Oregon we came across a couple of badger holes. Maybe next time I'll carry a snifter of gas and a piece of garden hose with me. Oh.....and a buddy with a shotgun. lol
 
It's actually highly illegal.....If you obey other fish and game laws why would you not obey that one.....There is a specific statute for that very thing in Oklahoma....I would not be suprised to see the same thing in other states.....It's a bad idea irregardless of the law....
 
I'm not trying to hijack this thread but I have a similar funny story that took place while I was a kid about 40 years ago. I used to raise quail and my neighbor used to raise pheasants for mostly gun clubs and some labratories (like Purina to test feed growth rates). Well the pheasants were raised in giant pens outdoors and rats (common brown rats aka sewer rats) would tunnel in the ground in the pheasant pens and eat both the pheasant feed and sometimes the birds at night. Almost daily there'd be just skeletons of what used to be a pheasant.

During the summer months, we'd pour a little gas down the rat holes and wait a few minutes for the heat to vaporize the gas. Then we'd light the vapors with a long stick. After the explosion and within seconds there would be rats pouring out of the flaming holes and we would shoot them with shotguns as they went every direction, often they'd be on fire as they emerged. This went on for hours sometimes and some of the explosions could get pretty big, occasionally lifting the ground an inch or so.

Well this was great fun for the first 3 or 4 times we did it until one day we missed one of the burning rats that I saw at the last second run into a barn full of dry hay. We almost lost the barn but managed to put it out with some great effort.
 
Back in the late 80s my cousin ran a trap line and when he would get a badger that had pulled a trap loose and drug it into a hole, he would use a piece of barbed wire fence to get them out of the hole. He would make a loop with one end of it and then start it in the hole and cork screw it into the hole. The barb wire would entangle the badger,using leather gloves, get a good grip on the wire and start pulling it out. He carried a 22 auto for finishing it off when he pulled them out of the hole. They are extremely pissed off when you yank them out. He even used this techniue on problem coyotes during the denning season.
 
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He had this little trick of runnning a 12' piece of heater hose down a hole, listening for the growls,









Snakes growl???
 
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Back in the late 80s my cousin ran a trap line and when he would get a badger that had pulled a trap loose and drug it into a hole, he would use a piece of barbed wire fence to get them out of the hole. He would make a loop with one end of it and then start it in the hole and cork screw it into the hole. The barb wire would entangle the badger,using leather gloves, get a good grip on the wire and start pulling it out. He carried a 22 auto for finishing it off when he pulled them out of the hole. They are extremely pissed off when you yank them out. He even used this techniue on problem coyotes during the denning season.



We do the the exact same thing for coyote pups when we see a den. It only has happened a few times through out the past 5 years but its pretty cool to do and see. When my dad first tried this I thought he was crazy but a few minutes after that he turned me into a believer.
 
Actually, none of the liquid makes it into the ground, only fumes.

It also works on coyote dens, etc.

R Buker, that was one heck of a suggestion, No smoking while handling gasoline! Smokers that handle gasoline are apt to turn into "Human Torches"!

Thanks for the reminder.

Snakes don't growl, brain working faster than fingers on keyboard. You will hear the badger growling in in the end of the heater hose if he is in the hole.

It is a good idea to check with the Fish and Game Laws, never thought of that. I always considered a "good" badger is a "dead" badger as most ranchers. It is always a good idea to stay within the law, I can never remember that I should be sneaking to do anything.
 
The Badgers here back fill their hole when they den for the day. What we do if we see a Badger "Whole up" is You shine a flash light down the whole and they will stick their head out to see why there is light, then you just shot them. Works day or night, But if you miss they will back fill the whole you can spend a fair amount of time digging one out.
 
In my opinion a den is like home base. A safe zone. If you cant call'em in or get them before they get to the hole then they get a pass. Just my opinion though.
 
Never fished one out of a hole but have shot a few. They have another bad habit of checking to see if you have left the area after they run down a hole. I normally wait 10 to 15 minutes after seeing one scurry down a hole. I shoot maybe 3/5 using this method. They just have to look!
 
I think I am with Stoney on this one. I dont kill coyotes, or any predator for that matter, to deplete their numbers. I hunt them because they are challenging and fun. Dens and new born pups get a pass from me as well. I dont however have an issue with landowners who use such tactics to protect their livestock. Badgers get a pass from me no matter where I see them. Its one of those critters I have no desire to kill. Porcupines are another.
 
Water down the hole works too. I had one dug in a corner inside the barn. The garden hose down the hole with a rope looped on top. They can tough it out for quite a while.
 
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I LOVE it! Now I've got to find a badger hole!



Ok, so I let my imagination and enthusiasm get the best of me sometimes. Lots of good ideas and opinions expressed here - and we do need to think sometimes about what we're doing and why we do it.

I'll just put those techniques in my toolbox for when I'm helping a farmer or rancher with a badger problem.
 
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In my opinion a den is like home base. A safe zone. If you cant call'em in or get them before they get to the hole then they get a pass. Just my opinion though.



I want to carry as little as possable while hunting, If I cant call them in or stalk them then they are safe. And I really dont want to do this with pups. I wont put a person down for doing it, just not my thing.
 
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