Glue Traps ?

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pitdog

pitdog

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When I first saw this pic I thought ' Poor Squirrel ', a few seconds later I thought ' I wonder if a few of these would be worth having in a survival kit ?'.

I thought they just caught Spiders and Silverfish, never dreamed that some could catch rodents. I started to think that maybe if baited and placed in trees they could also catch small birds that come to feed or roost. On the floor they could obviously catch mice. Obviously these would be for short term survival situations only, what do you think ?

 
I wouldn't want to deal with the sticky stuff (whatever it is.) Also, it's a single use trap (although it looks flat enough that you could carry a few. All in all, I think a traditional rat trap would be better.
 
I have used the smaller ones for mice, but when I knew that something bigger (I thought chipmunk) was getting into my basement cupboards, I put down one of the rat-sized traps. The next day I found a huge tuft of grey-red fur that I know had to constitute most of a squirrel's tail. I then borrowed a live trap, and indeed caught a squirrel - missing most of his tail fur - the next day. However, the glue trap was a large one and not enough to get the squirrel. Birds might be doable, but only very small ones.
 
I've used em for mice and they are dang near impossible to seperate the animal from the trap. I'd say a few regular spring type rat traps would work better for actual game.
 
Hell of a way to go.
Kind of a single use item. I think wire snare,dead fall would be my choice.
 
Definitely single use. I used one to catch a rat that made a home in my car once. Tried to pull him off to reuse the trap. He came off. His leg stayed. Kinda felt bad for the poor guy.
 
I do pest control and try to avoid using glueboards unless the client requests them.

Snaptraps and mechanical multicatch traps work better and are more humane, I have seen animals live over 24hrs on those glueboards bleeding from the face etc squealing. Definite bad way to go.
IMOP
 
While nasty I often skin mice and rats for my big 5 foot lizards that I keep at home. It's so they don't get impacted. It would work feasibly well. If you slit them around the neck area and down their underside from experience they pop right out of their skin whole if you grab them by the neck.

In places like India and China it's a normal protein for the poor so I suppose it could work just based on how available they are in an area.
 
The most widespread application of these entanglements has been the so-called "bird limes." These
sticky substances from natural gums of plants were painted on twigs in areas where the birds were apt
to light. They have been used since the time of the ancient Romans and were first mentioned in the
literature as early as 1678 (Bateman 1977). "Liming" was the predominant method of trapping birds in
Europe from antiquity to the late 19th century when small birds were trapped on a large scale for food
and sport (Hogarth 1929). The technique is even mentioned several times in Shakespeare (Armstrong 1975,
Brusewitz 1969):
"Birds never lim'd;
No secret bushes fear."
"Thou'dst never fear the net nor lime
The pitfall nor the gin."
Birds are more easily caught than mammals. The adhesive materials can easily gum up flight feathers
and the bird's light weight makes it more difficult for it to escape entanglements. The use of glues
against mammals was not as effective nor was widespread. Rat glues were used as early as the 18th
century when a rat control manual (Holland 1802) suggested putting a strip of bacon on a one-meter board
smeared with bird lime. Glues were even used to catch bigger game. The natives of India reportedly
spread the juice of the peepul tree (Ficus religiosa) on leaves along jungle trails. Tigers attempting
to get the sticky leaves off their paws would become blinded as they rubbed their faces with their paws
(Burton 1918). Joseph Gabos pioneered the use of rat glues into this country around 1920.
 
A pest control guy put some out in a stockroom at my work place where I worked years ago to catch some field mice that were coming from a ranch behind the building. One morning I came in and found a rat snake with a mouse in its mouth and a sticky pad stuck to its head. We would have been better off without the sticky pads and just left the snake alone to take care of the problem.

Interesting idea for survival use though.
 
I think it would be much easier to make or buy some snares. Thompson snares are well made and can be had for about $13 for two. Also you can always make your own out of wire, it doesn't seem like a terrible idea but it doesn't kill them immediately and there are a lot of more effective options out there.
 
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