Anyone heard of Dan Bishop and...

JimT

JimT

New member
Competiton Free Trapping? My dad loaned me a set of plans for building live traps. They say they are copyrighted by Dan Bishop. The "CFT" was his idea to sell live traps I believe. Dad bought the plans by mail for a few bucks in the 80's. If I wouldn't get in copyright hotwater I'd like to put these up for general use. Anyone know if this guy is still around?

Jim
 
I read on a page in trapperman.com or this site that Dan passed away, not sure if it was true.He was from WI, I had trouble with an order from him.T.20
 
Hmm, searched both places for his name, nothing came up at either. Also did a Whitepages.com search and nothing.
 
According to a post on trapperman.com he has passed on. He was from Evansville, WI. A fellow that goes by "Beav" on trapperman knew him (from same general area I believe).
 
Dan used to travel around the country and gave trapping clinics. He would sell bait and lure and other stuff. the reason I know? I made all the bait for him. I used to sell him 100's of gallons of my bait and he would put his own label on it and sell it.
FWIW
Steve
 
I never bought any of his stuff, it looked like watered down gland lure. I bought his instuctional tape and book, and attended his seminar in FT.Dodge. This was 20 years ago,or more? I am glad I took instructions from a better trapper, later. T.20
 
T20,
Didnt say he had good lure, but he did have a great bait. I dont recall who made his lure for him. And yes, it was over 20 years ago. It was strictly a business deal for me. I was selling bait and lure and snares at the time. Dan liked my bait and we made a deal. I too took instruction from better trappers. One was Bill Nelson,1970, another was a guy named Johnny Thorpe,(I spent a week in the Adirondacks with John) another guy was Bob Wendt,(I have known Bob now for almost 30 years and we trapped together all over this country) O'Gorman, Bill Austin,Keith Gregerson, are a few others I have paid good money to learn what they know, and I must say each man was worth every pennie and then some, and it has been returned to me a 100 fold over these years.

K9,
I havent sold any bait for alot of years. My bait was an old Bill Nelson formula that I bought back in 1974 from one of Bill's students and I still make it for my own use as well as a couple of friends. It is a bobcat meat base, slightly tainted, then fixed and preserved and a bunch of other stuff added to give it that great odor. Dan Bishop sold so many gallons of that stuff, that I had to buy bobcat carcusses from Fuller Laugeman just to fill orders. Finally couldnt keep up with the demand and went back to selling it on my own label. He was the only person that put his label on it. I didnt mind as I was making very good money on it at the time.
FWIW
Steve
 
...and now you know...theRrrrrrrrest of the story
grinning-smiley-021.gif
 
Hmm, 70 years, wow. So, then, if someone wanted a copy of his plans now, how would they get them? I'm past wanting to put them on the web now, I'm just curious. I guess they would be considered out of print and you simply couldn't get them at all? Interesting. Doesn't really make sense to me. If he has passed on, and no one stands to gain from the sale of his material, then why not put it into the public domain?

Thanks for the info guys,
Jim

PS I'm trying to build by his plans right now and having a heck of a time! The stupid thing won't fit inside the wood frame and I don't know why!
 
I understand Steve. Bobcat carcasses can be tough to come by in bulk. I tried using tainted horse some years ago, and found it to be pretty good bait also. Back then I had access to lot's of horse meat so it was no big deal. Now that I live back in Iowa it is harder to come by. When someone's horse dies around here they are too attached to it to have some trapper hacking it up.

Doubtful that you attend Iowa Conventions, however if you attend NTA Conventions I would enjoy visiting with you next year. It is in Mo.
 
Jim,

Sounds like you will never have a problem in 70 years, BUT:

Whoever does own the copyright or patent would have to pay a small maintenance fee to keep it current and out of the public domain. Unlikely, from what I read here that this is happening. Just make sure that YOU aren't profiting from posting the plans and you will be ok. It's similar to a book or magazine in that you own a legitimate copy and can share it with others as you choose. You have documented your attempt to determine present ownership rights here (I'm guessing that it resides somewhere in a bunch of boxes of Grandpas crapola). So you are not making money, own a legitimate copy, have been unable to locate legitimate ownership, and are not actively involved in a conspiricy to defraud legitimate ownership rights (the music "sharing" caveat that is routinely whipped up in court).

Let's assume for a minute that you WERE a cheating, stealing, lying, no good cuss out to swindle the owner of this design for big bucks. EVEN IF he did know about, and did want to do something about it, he would have to have about $40K, and a not so average ambulance chasing big city attorney to pursue the matter. And then he would only be able to make you stop doing it from now on.

Go ahead. Post away.
 
My husband bought his book with cassette tapes and plans years ago. We still have it. I have it for sale on eBay right now.
 
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