Cable Restraint vs. Snare

What are the differences between a cable restraint and a snare? There are not many differences but they are important. Let’s learn more about them.

Cable Restraint

Typically cable restraints are designed to capture the animal but not kill the animal. The difference is in the locks. Cable restraints are designed to be a non locking snare thus as the animal pulls on the snare the snare gets tighter but will then relax its tension when the pulling stops.

Sometimes cable restraints have stops or small pieces of metal crimped onto the cable to keep the loop form getting too small. Many cable restraints have the same locks as snares but have these stops to modify them. These are often called deer stops because the most common purpose is to stop the snare from catching deer.

Cable restraints are still a kill trap when the trapped animal is able to get entangled and wrap around a kill pole or tree. This causes the animal to get hung up and choked out even if a cable restraint is being used. Some states consider it a cable restraint if it is set on land and the animal can’t get entangled.

Snares

A snare on the other from a cable restraint. A snare is more often times designed to dispatch the animal humanely and quickly. Snares can be entangled or cause an animal such as a beaver to drown in the water.

Some snares such as power snares have a large spring attached to the snare so after a coyote or fox is trapped in the snare a large spring fires and applies pressure to the snare around the animals neck and causes them to die extremely fast. Usually in one or two minutes.

Kill poles are metal or wood poles that are places in the ground where an animal in a snare could get tangled up in causing the weight of the animal to put more pressure on the snare. This also can cause the animal to die more quickly in the snare.

Conclusion

After comparing cable restraints and snares some people may focus on the part of the trap where the animal dies and say that any trap that kill is inhumane. This is actually not true. This is one of the cleanest ways to dispatch an animal and it is very quick and humane.

Using a snare pole or catch pole has been one of the cleanest ways to dispatch an animal in a trap for me when I am in city limits and unable to use a gun. It is quick and efficient and most humane way of dispatching an animal.

Snares have been around for thousands of years and will continue to be a common trap to use whether they have cable restraint modifications or not they are still very effective.