We have started utalising double set Doc 200 traps. Quite often when we have a capture both traps will trigger. Is there any simple modifications that i could make in the field to reduce sympathetic firing? Pictures would be helpful!
Thanks for your time
Some advice that I received some time ago was to loosen the base-bolts that hold the trap in place. Just a little, or they become too difficult to re-set. It reduces the rigidity between the two mechanisms and seems to have MOSTLY fixed the problem of sympathetic trigger.
Placing a decent sized rock on top of the box should help reduce sympathetic firing as it will absorb some of the energy when the trap fires.
Thank you, that is a simple solution, ill do some tests with that method.
Thank you, ill do some tests with that method and see how i get on
Hi. We have 100+ traps in double boxes and sympathy springing is an exception. We calibrate all our traps to spring at >=100g. When this is done we only get sympathy springing occasionally, even on uneven ground. We use a hacksaw blade and adjust the sear gap to the thickness of the blade. This is our solution.
But, there are often faults in DOC200 manufacture, which can affect performance.
Brian Bowell.
Hi Brian, Thanks for that, I’ve calibrated ours to slightly less than that, so that could be the answer as to why we have so much sympathy firing.
Tom
Agree with Brian. We have about 350 double-set DOC 200s. Sympathetic spring off is VERY rare for us. We calibrate to about 80 grams.
I think it’s very important that the trap be very stable and rigidly set in place. We will use a spade to level an area and then bed the trap into the dirt well. We use stakes in areas where stock interference is possible. Overall we have excellent success with the double DOCs; they’re quite likely to catch a rat and a stoat and there have been the occasional double-mustelid kills. Very satisfying!!
Cam Speedy has a series of short videos.
This one is a summary of points above.
Hi my reply is a bit late but I think relevant. I do not recommend setting the trip weight too low, nothing to do with sympathetic firing but you find my comments on other posts and an ongoing discussion. in Tips and Tricks. DOC 200 have a problem with going off but nothing caught even in NAWAC testing 15% of rats were not caught in Lincoln it was over 20%. So when you set the trap too fine you risk the animal not being fully engaged and far enough across the treadle plate when the trap goes off.
you could check back through you records and see how many times it is recoded that trap has gone off but caught nothing
cheers