Norm Blackwell grew up in the small town of AuGres in Northern Michigan. He started trapping at the age of 14. Living on Lake Huron/ Saginaw Bay he started trapping muskrats, raccoons and beaver. After the fur boom of the 80′s, he was still having farmers/homeowners call him to come trap nuisance wildlife. He was the 54^th person in Michigan to get an ADC license. A few years later he moved to Georgia, where he became licensed for ADC work as well. As you can imagine, Georgia was like moving to a different country compared to where he was from. After being in Georgia for a short time, he learned about the live market for coyote and fox. At that time they were paying $75.00 for reds, $35.00 for grays and $100.00 for coyote. He trapped for the live market for several years along with ADC work, until the live market fell. After that, he started trapping turtles for a turtle farm in Florida, he would deliver six to eight thousand pounds of snapping turtles as well as various other types of turtles a year. He met up with a gator trapper from South Georgia around that time and started helping him trap nuisance gators. Which he still does today when he needs extra help. During this time he also commercial catfished on Lake Seminole, the Chattahoochee River and the Fort Gaines area.

He met several people along the way that had large tracks of land of hunting clubs and plantations. They seemed to all have the same problem with predators. This is when he started concentrating on predator control. He started out just trapping in Georgia and it was not long before he was traveling to the surrounding states doing predator control, including Texas with Predator Control Group. As you can see, he has made his living off the land for most of his life. Although it has not been easy from time to time, with a mindset of “failure is never an option”, and the strong support of his family, he would not trade it for anything in the world.

Clint Locklear

Clint started trapping in Alaska for martin and red fox. After returning home to TN, he ran mixed lines for water animals and land predators. For four years Clint trapped for a TN county to control their beaver problems. While doing this, he had 3 years over 700 beaver and one over 1,100 beaver. Like all things do, this contract ended and he went into long lining fur trapping all over the country. Always looking at the fur prices, he would chase everything from coyotes to muskrats to make a full-time living trapping. Next Clint targeted the predators. His clients were deer ranches, quail plantations, turkey hunting camps and worked on educating the members of the Quality Deer management  Association about the real world effects of predator damage. While Clint was getting sound footing in the coyote, bobcat and nest predator business, he was still pounding fur in several different states. He has trapped in 24 states in America and Canada.

Clint has produced several trapping videos, written 3 books, and held trapping schools and predator schools for years now. When he has the time, he gives personal instruction to trappers from all across the country. Clint has made his total living from the trapping industry for over a decade now.

On his predator control jobs in Texas and several other states, he has learned the art of catching predators. No longer is 9-12 bobcats a day or 10-18 coyotes a day a big deal. It is just another day at the office. What he likes as much as putting steel on animals is to help other trappers to do the same.