THE OMEO WOMBAT TRAP
Wombats naturally have a destructive bulldozer earth-moving capability. They can and do excavate and undermine houses and sheds up on stumps by digging their large tunnels underneath the floor boards. Wombat heads are great for repeatedly barging through farm fences creating multiple big holes that then let stock through. Wombats do not always use the same fence hole they created, causing various damage sites to be repaired.
Cost is relative. These traps pay for themselves compared to the costs and time spent on getting experts in to realign a sinking house or shed back to level and ongoing fencing repairs.
The Omeo Wombat trap is made to order when you buy it. There is a certain amount of hand work in the construction of these solid traps. They are built to last for the long term with quality galvanized metal, precision spot welding and experienced workmanship.
PRACTICAL WOMBAT TRAPPING INFORMATION
Give your new trap a hose down with plain water (never use detergents or other chemicals on it) and when the trap is set on location, give it a light spray all over with eucalyptus oil. This is to mask the invisible factory and human scent that the new trap will be covered with. Doing this puts the odds in your favour. Thereafter, handle the trap with chemical-free clean gloves.
When setting the trap, avoid using footwear that you have walked through a workshop, service station or down the street, as your boots will leave even the slightest trace of foreign man-made scents around the trap site, enough to deter a wild animal from going near that scent and the trap.
Walk your footwear through cow, sheep or other non-meat eating animal manure if it is available on the property to cover the man-made chemical smells on your shoes when setting up the trap site. Use clean, chemical-free gloves to handle the trap. All wild animals are sensitive to and wary of unfamiliar scents which may put them off entering the trap.
Adult wombats are strong animals. The Omeo Wombat Trap is a seriously strong and large trap, made of galvanized steel. It is a live capture wire cage trap built specifically for wombat trapping without harming the animal.
Determine where the fresh wombat activity is to place the trap on level ground. Anchor and tie this trap with wire to a star picket hammered in on each corner of the trap for stability, ensuring that the pickets do not interfere with the trap mechanism.
Remember where you set the trap.
If an adult female wombat is trapped, she may be carrying young. Do not separate them.
Check traps at least once a day for live captures. If you trap an unintended animal or a pet, no harm is done. Just let it out, unless it is a feral, like cats, foxes, wild dogs or rabbits. Never let them go alive to breed up and kill thousands more native animals each or to destroy pasture. Except for rabbits, these feral animals usually go after meat smells but there are always surprises to be had in the natural world and you wonder how that happened.
Cover the cage with the trapped animal with an old blanket as soon as you have it and for the relocation journey, to reduce daylight and stress on the wombat.
WOMBAT TRAP BAIT
Wombats are nocturnal herbivores. They spend between three and eight hours each night grazing on their favourite food which is native grasses. Other common meals for a wombat include roots, scrub, herbs and bark. And they love carrots.
Without overfeeding them, lay a scent trail of small bits of carrot here and there in a line a meter or three long, leading into the trap and inside it on the floor up to the point of the floor treadle. Place a few whole fresh carrots up behind the treadle plate at the very back of the trap but not that many carrots that the bait ends up working its way underneath the treadle plate which will stop the trap door from dropping.
Tie or skewer the whole carrots to the floor of the trap with a tent peg so the bait does not move around with trap movement or the wind. Or thread the carrots on a wire tied from one side of the rear of the trap to the other side.
FIRST, GET YOUR PERMIT TO TRAP WOMBATS
Wombats are a legally protected native Australian animal that is disappearing in overall numbers from loss of habitat, bush fires, road kills and the contagious mange disease. A permit is required before trapping and relocating wombats. It is illegal to shoot, kill or poison wombats (and other native animals) but wombats can legally be trapped and relocated. Trapping of havoc-weraking wombats is doing the right thing.
Contact the local wildlife authority in your area to obtain your personal permit before trapping begins. Consequences are you can cop a super expensive fine and/or up to two years jail time for being involved in illegal animal trapping, poisoning or shooting.
See: Farm worker who poisoned 406 wedge-tailed eagles in east Gippsland jailed and fined - ABC News.html
It is illegal to use any traps for any animal, feral or native, that have a hook to hold the bait. It is also illegal to use leg hold traps that have the old-time serrated and painful jaws that break bones to hold the animal. Permitted leg hold traps have protective rubber jaws that work. You don't have to torture an animal to trap it.
COMMON SENSE
Use a professionally-made legal trap and do not try and trap a wombat is a small trap or a trap made of feeble materials.
SAFETY
Plan in advance how you are going to quickly and safely lift this heavy trap with a big wombat in it onto a vehicle. Tie the trap down well on the vehicle and relocate the animal elsewhere to a natural habitat well away from main roads without damaging yourself, the wombat or the trap.
AUSTRALIAN MADE
The Omeo Wombat Trap is designed and manufactured in Australia to current Australian trap compliance regulations.
GST
For farms run as a business that have an ABN, you may be eligible to claim the 10% GST back from our tax invoice for vermin control products. Ask your accountant about this.
SHIPPING
Shipping is by courier to your Australian street address. Shipping prices are at cost.
A forklift on your site to unload this heavy trap from the delivery truck is very helpful and fast for you to unload, or have at least two people on site (excluding the driver) to unload it.
Courier companies may charge you an additional fee if the driver has to slow down deliveries to help you manually unload this heavy trap. Or they may have workplace health and safety regulations and insurance policies to comply with that do not permit the driver to manually unload products above a certain weight.
Shipping price is individually determined by size, cubed by length, width, height, plus weight and your delivery location. This is a large, solid trap built to do its job over and over so it is more expensive to ship than a little rat trap.
Town delivery locations are usually cheaper for trap buyers than the back of beyond. Some remote trap customers have their traps delivered to their neatest freight depot for their collection later, and where fork lifts are available at the depot for truck unloading and reloading onto their vehicle.
Your trap order may need an individual shipping quote from IT'S A TRAP! to send it to your location. Just phone or email us with your town, state and postcode for the shipping price.
CLAIMS
If the trap is damaged in transit before you collect it, you have seven days from despatch to make a claim. After this time, no claims are accepted. Clear photos of the damage are to be emailed with your notification to IT'S A TRAP! which will be sent to the freight company.
We do not provide refunds for customers who change their mind after purchase.
OMEO WOMBAT TRAP DIMENSIONS
Length 1215 mm
Width 610 mm
Height 610 mm
Wire thickness 3 mm
Weight 40 kg
