How to Use Fish Traps for Scrap

Fish traps require no blueprint, and can be crafted for 200 wood and 5 cloth. They can be loaded with bait to 'trap' fish which can then be gutted for loot or traded in for scrap. Simply put, this is how to use them:

• Place trap slightly under the water level, either on the ground or on a building block
  
• Load the trap with bait
  
• Wait a minute or 2
  
• When you hear a splashing noise, the trap has caught something
  
• Interact with the trap to re-arm it and optionally remove your trapped fish
  
• Gut the fish or keep it to trade in at fishing village for scrap

Some important notes:

• Traps have a 50% chance of failure, causing them to lose the bait but not catch the fish. If this happens you don't need to reset the trap.
  
• Traps always act as if they are in 5 meter deep water, meaning they can't catch small sharks or orange roughies, but can catch anything else.

Various food items can have a bait level that can be used to catch some types of fish at certain water depths. In the case of fish traps, the depth is always considered 5 meters, which cannot catch the best fish like small sharks, but can catch good fish like salmon or catfish.

Bait also has a stack level, meaning some lower level baits can be 'stacked' multiple times to act like a higher level bait. Example, berries are level 1, but you can use 5 at a time to act as a level 5 bait. This happens automatically, consuming the highest stack count it can.

For bait levels, I recommend checking out Rustlabs but I'll post a screenshot from their website below. Generally speaking for the most value you want to use bait that stacks up to level 5-10.

If you want a video getting into fish traps a bit more and how they can harmonize with grow operations, check this out:

▶ YouTube

Generally speaking you should gut the little fish that are level 2 as they are not worth re-fishing in traps. Lower value level 10 fish should be re-fished into higher value level 10 fish, meaning just put trout or yellow perch back into traps. Even with the 50% failure it's still worth it; 1 salmon is worth more than 2 trout. Salmon or catfish can be traded in for scrap at fishing village. But the value of gutting them is decent as well if you need blue cards. There is a 20% chance to get a blue card when gutting salmon, catfish, small sharks, or orange roughies. You'll also get a decent amount of animal fat and raw fish. So you can generally do either one based on your needs. If it's small sharks I'd say the scrap value of the trade in is worth more than the equivalent gutting value, but traps can't catch small sharks, only salmon and catfish which have a lower trade in value.

If you want a simple and cheap fish trap base design, feel free to check this one out:

▶ YouTube