these cases, advertising is never the way to go. You'll have to change your game plan; break from your standards. Different lures. Different sets. Usually you find out you're facing off with one of these furbearers when it digs up a few of your bedded traps or leaves tracks on the front door of one of your pocket or cubby sets without visiting. If it's a smart raccoon, the best way to take it is through the use of blind or trail sets. I remember taking one raccoon that was ignoring two of my cubbies along a small spring run. After about a week, I set two blind sets in the flow where it narrowed to about 6 inches. The next morning that raccoon was waiting for me. It carried the scars of two previous trap escapes. An educated furbearer, but it still behaved like other raccoons. Red foxes can be equally troublesome. If one starts flipping traps at your dirt-holes, there are two basic approaches I've used to reel them in. Sometimes they work; sometimes they don't. In both cases, I leave the set(s) with which it tampered because that fox's scent near the set instantly makes it more attractive to other foxes passing through. My preferred response is to put in a urine-post set that blends in with the groundcover like it's been there forever. I use a unopened bottle of fox urine to ensure I don't tip off the fox. The set should be placed about 15 feet away from the disturbed set so the wind will 8 "Advertising matters a great deal." waft that urine odor toward it. Wear rubber gloves and footwear. Another approach - although only moderately successful - is to try planting another trap about 5 inches in front and off-center of a bedded trap in a new set in the same area. The idea is to catch the trap-flipper while it's in the act of fishing for the trap in the new set's bed. The dirthole set should have a bed sifted with dirt from the hole. The blind set's bed should be blended with surrounding groundcover and the trap must be bedded solidly so it doesn't move if the fox steps on the spring or a jaw. If you do it right, you'll have trouble seeing the blind set the next day. The rest is up to the fox and, of course, the weather. These are just a few ideas for WWW.PENNGAMENEWS.COMhttp://WWW.PENNGAMENEWS.COM