Snaring my way across Great Bear Island? just how many rabbits can one guy eat?

[piddy3825]

Today is a good day to catch some pesky wabbits!  I am surprised at my early morning Trifecta as I begin my attempt to bring the Hare population in Mystery Lake into check.  

This definitely looks like a good start.  

Got a little hungry so I figured I'd grill up some rabbit chucks caveman style on some hot rocks.  Plenty of wood around here and nicely secluded too.  couple of pesky wolves about too, but not to worry as I can hold my own.  

I'm just bored enough right now with virus cabin fever, that I'm gonna try to finally get that rabbit snare achievement badge.  My goal is to do so in by moving daily from one rabbit hunting ground to another.  I figure if each area is fresh daily, then the odds of multiple snare successes should be in order.  My own personal best for a single harvest was 7 hares, on Jack Rabbit Island of course out on Coastal Highway.   I'd like to think that by moving a lot I should at least get 2 per night although 3 is typically minimum in order to meet daily caloric requirements.  At least I can be crunching on some cattails.  

So,  have you completed this achievement?  Would like to hear your strategy and advice you might be inclined to offer.  

thanks for reading!

 

[odium]

you can do the hill behind trappers and the low spot by the bear cave right up past the barn.  drop 10 snares on each and youre set for 5-8 rabbits per day.  it gets really boring dealing with them all honestly.  so much caloric output for a small return

[Jimmy]

I've never observed a notable decline in snare returns from over-hunting. So far as I can tell, there's no penalty for simply stacking a few dozen snares in a tiny space and collecting rabbits infinitely. Past the initial investment of time and energy crafting the snares, you get a no-effort means of replenishing your food supplies, assuming you have fire to cook them.

Really, the only downside is the boring nature of existence surviving on snared rabbits. With no real skill involved, it's tedious grinding for little reward beyond watching the days go by. That's fine if you're chasing achievements, but otherwise I'd rather have fun exploring, actively hunting, and occasionally getting chased by the odd predator.

[piddy3825]

8 hours ago, Jimmy said:

I've never observed a notable decline in snare returns from over-hunting.

Well, I'd have to disagree to a limited extent.   When you saturate an area with snares you might fill a majority, on your first couple of days, but you will see diminishing returns as the local hare population is culled.  It does take a couple of days for them to respawn just like deer or wolves.  So spreading your snares out between known rabbit locations does help to keep the snare count steady imho.  But you are correct in that the effort is tedious, which is why I like to move from one location to another every other day or so.  At least I get a change of scenery and the opportunity to bag a deer or wolf on  during my excursion.  

[piddy3825]

This is the glen just kitty corner across the tracks from Camp Office.  Another 3 for 3 harvest.  I opened the door and made a bee line for these traps.  It's early in the morning and I was hoping to avoid any other furry entanglements...  I made it back to camp office unscathed.  I took my time harvesting and noticed for the first time you can harvest by hand.  takes like an hour and half but it can be done.  at least saves on the wear and tear of your sharps from that limited supplies/use perspective.  It does make the day go by pretty fast, 3 rabbits take 4.5 hours to harvest by hand, then there's still the cooking time.   that's a good two more hours and before you know it another day has gone by.  I did use the time there to make some deerskin pants.  I was a lot warmer when I headed back to main camp.

 

Found another good spot slightly up hill from Clear Cut.  Keeping the streak of 3x3 going for now.  

again early in the morning to avoid fluffy.  So far so good.  Funny thing I noticed is how little frozen the carcass's are when I mad dash from the door of camp to the killing fields.  I guess the game mechanic is that they snare the moment you step outside from an interior cell of some similar save event.  At any rate these were frozen under 8% when I found them, so that's a pretty fresh kill imho. 

[piddy3825]

I had an errand to run so I did a quick one day run out to ML and of course set my 3 snare rabbit harvesting system up before I retired for the evening.

The next morning I jumped out early and briskly proceeded to inspect my traps.

The CH bunnies aren't so easy to fool.    One is better than none, although the pesky buggers did mange to break one of the snares and escape to tell about it.  I will put this attempt in the rabbit's win column.

[ajb1978]

On 5/5/2020 at 12:36 PM, piddy3825 said:

When you saturate an area with snares you might fill a majority, on your first couple of days, but you will see diminishing returns as the local hare population is culled. 

I dunno about that, I earned the badge using the little rabbit grove out by Molly's barn.  I started off with just a few, then as the guts started to cure, used that to craft more.  Towards the end I had something like 30 snares set up there, pulling in 15+ rabbits per day easy.  They never stopped coming.

Edited May 7, 2020 by ajb1978
corrected "achievement" to "badge"

[piddy3825]

4 hours ago, ajb1978 said:

I dunno about that, I earned the badge using the little rabbit grove out by Molly's barn.  I started off with just a few, then as the guts started to cure, used that to craft more.  Towards the end I had something like 30 snares set up there, pulling in 15+ rabbits per day easy.  They never stopped coming.

I am your Padawan...  You are Master!

I certainly had some productive harvests but no where near that kind of daily yield.  But I think the most I've ever set up is maybe 12 traps at best.  I spent a little time at a workbench and crafted what I could which basically doubled my snare sets.  First night out 5 fresh hares and one ruined set.  The way I look at it, that's five more traps in a few days...  I think I will follow your lead and see where it takes me.  As always, appreciate your insight and input Master @ajb1978

[ajb1978]

7 hours ago, piddy3825 said:

I certainly had some productive harvests but no where near that kind of daily yield. 

I don't have any hard data since trapping rabbits is not really my thing in normal play, but that area by Molly's barn was just insane for rabbit generation. I've never had such good luck anywhere else.  Although to be fair, I'd never set up a grid of a few dozen snares either.  It kind of felt like they had an almost exponential effect, like multiple snares near each other boosted each other's effectiveness.  The first week-ish I maybe snared 3 rabbits, but once I got a few more snares in place, it just took off like a wildfire.  I chose to harvest them bare handed since I had nothing better to do with my life at the time, and there was barely enough time in the day to keep up with rabbit processing.

[UTC-10]

It may have changed since early access but I recall one of my early sandboxes where I would lay two or three snares on Jackrabbit island and after getting a good number of rabbits over time, the number started to drop off.  Eventually I didn't get any snared rabbits and even on the island, I didn't see any rabbits.  I went to Desolation Point to do stuff, came back in about a month (I think) and the visible rabbit population still was almost non-existent.  

At the time there seemed to be discussion about hunting/snaring out an area and its effects but that was back in early access and it might have been tried and maybe abandoned. I guess it was decided that if players want 80 rabbit hides (I think I got that many) then let them play as they want to play.  Realism should only go so far.

I have not tried extensive snaring since then but have gotten the badge.  That experience still affects my perception of my effect on the rabbits. 

[piddy3825]

27 minutes ago, UTC-10 said:

It may have changed since early access but I recall one of my early sandboxes where I would lay two or three snares on Jackrabbit island and after getting a good number of rabbits over time, the number started to drop off.  Eventually I didn't get any snared rabbits and even on the island, I didn't see any rabbits.  

I'm sure the mechanics have been altered quite a bit since the early access days, but yes, I too recall similar circumstances on Jackrabbit Island.  You'd think with a name like that it would be practically covered with rabbits!  

On a side note, I went to University in Bellingham, WA.  I ended up meeting a biology grad student there who lived on one of the islands in the San Juan Island chain located just off the coast of Washington state and between Vancouver Island, Canada.  You had to either take a ferry service or private boat to get there.  He invited me to come along for one their annual "Rabbit Round Up," events where they had a fair with rides etc.  The whole weekend was structured around culling rabbits.  Literally thousands of rabbits caught, killed and processed.  The rabbit population there was "accidently" let loose and with no 4 legged predators on the island the rabbit population literally exploded into the millions.  Not sure what it is like now a days, but if your interested in a little history follow the link below.

https://historylink.org/File/11018

[piddy3825]

Having followed through with the saturation snaring plan, I peppered the area with 17 snares and took my biggest harvest to date of nine hares.  Lost 3 snares but definitely worth the trouble, still got 14 so not gonna to much.  besides, these things are kinda heavy.

 

I decided test a little theory and did not move any of the snares after having retrieved their yield.  I removed the broken ones and they headed back to camp where I laboriously spent the remainder of the day harvesting and cooking.  After a another good nights sleep on a full stomach I'm up early in the morning and head out to check my trap lines.

Ok, still had some production, but only five rabbits.  And wouldn't you know all in the traps that didn't hit the day before.  I'm assuming that one you catch a bunny you have to consider that snare to be sprung and you have to pick it up and reset it or else it just wont work.  That could be the reason why a player might see "diminishing returns" if they don't actively reset a trap that has been sprung?  Makes sense to me.  I'll have to experiment a little more with it, but honestly it was a good break in my game play not having to harvest and roast bunny's all day.  I now have one full file cabinet full of cooked rabbit.  

one a side note, I was happy Mr. Wolf thought he had a easy snack coming, cause he was a delicious change of pace for dinner.

[piddy3825]

I had just redeployed a series of snares and found  this bunny contemplating his path.   

“Be brave, little rabbit. Take a chance.”
― Cherise Sinclair, Breaking Free

 

[piddy3825]

Continuing on with this achievement/badge attempt, I have made a few observations regarding placement and subsequent yields.   Traps that  are moved daily and reset always seem to be more productive regardless of placement.  I don't think it matters at all if you get all creative in your snare placement and or deployment pattern.  Here's four separate layouts i tried over this week of game play.

 

I dropped 12 traps in kinda a staggered fashion and as I expected a good harvest.  7 out of 12.  Not bad at all I'd say, 58% fill rate if I'm doing the math right.  Sustained two ruined traps in the process.  I again picked up all traps, moved a short distance to the side and redeployed the 10 functional snares.

 

Next morning, same routine... up and early to check snares.  5 out of 10 once again.  50% fill rate.  I think I'm starting to see some kinda of pattern here? 

For some reason at this point, I just started rapping some DMX ; 

Y'all gon' make me lose my mind
Up in here, up in here
Y'all gon' make me go all out
Up in here, up in here

I was just thinking about harvesting and cooking five more hares...

So of course, I pickup 'em all up and reset my rigs for another day.

 

Yes, a pattern is certainly starting to emerge...  5 out of 10 traps filled...  again 50% fill rate.  Did loose two snares so now down to 8 functional traps.  Still almost 3 times more than I started with so not worried.  By now there is so much gut curing that I'm not gonna run out anytime soon.  Okay, time to regroup, redeploy and go spend the rest of the day cleaning and cooking rabbit meat.  

 

Another glorious morning as I check my snare line.  What do you know?  4 out of 8 snares filled.  again a 50% fill rate...

lather, rinse, repeat...  

 

 

[odizzido]

On 5/7/2020 at 7:10 AM, ajb1978 said:

  I chose to harvest them bare handed since I had nothing better to do with my life at the time, and there was barely enough time in the day to keep up with rabbit processing.

LOL I found that really funny for some reason. You probably had to eat like 15+ a day too. It still hasn't gotten old for me to know our character eats an entire wolf in one day. Still, I can't wait to mod that out.

[piddy3825]

As I was getting weary of snaring rabbits, I decided to just line up the remaining snare sets in a straight line, didnt care if I caught anything or not...

Imagine my surprise when I check the trap line the next morning.  5 out of 8 traps filled.  definite increase in catch percentage, 62% if my math skills are correct.  I think this goes to prove, it doesn't make a lick of difference on how you set your snares up.  just set up anywhere that you find rabbits and they will just keep on coming...

At this point I felt some serious ju-ju rabbit magic had begun to manifest itself in me...  I am becoming the Rabbit Master, the Hare Whisperer, the Bunny Bopper...  Time for one more foray.   

Using my darkest rabbit magic, I laid my snare set out in a octagon and invoked the incantation ORYCTOLAGUS CUNICULUS,  which I had found scrawled in one of the survival guides I recently found.  Fortunately there was an aurora that night night which provided the necessary earth energies and in the morning when I went to check, I found 6 of 8 traps filled.  My highest fill rate yet of 75%   I wish I would have found that guide when I first started on this quest.  I retreat to base camps to begin the laborious process of harvesting and cooking.

The next morning as I awaken I am rewarded!  

Run and be free...

Edited May 10, 2020 by piddy3825
spelling

[RandomP1ayer]

12 hours ago, piddy3825 said:

 

Using my darkest rabbit magic, I laid my snare set out in a octagon and invoked the incantation ORYCTOLAGUS CUNICULUS,  which I had found scrawled in one of the survival guides I recently found. 

LOL,  I wasn't sure what I was reading when I came across this...  At first glance I wasn't sure if this was a spell from a Harry Potter book or a sexual position from the Kama Sutra.

[piddy3825]

11 hours ago, RandomP1ayer said:

LOL,  I wasn't sure what I was reading when I came across this...  At first glance I wasn't sure if this was a spell from a Harry Potter book or a sexual position from the Kama Sutra.

ha ha, it's merely the scientific name for rabbit! 😁