Do you use a much different technique, trap, or lures for out of season nuisance beaver trapping than you do during season? Just curious if their actions and behavior is different throughout the year. How do you trap the new young beavers. Tricks to avoid incidental otter? I have a spot that I'll be nuisance trapping this year. They are bank beavers in a large creek, and are really hammering the oak trees. Thanks

Using castor for beaver is a great way to avoid otter, in or out of season. Castor sets placed in thick stuff in which you have made a small opening for the trap or traps will bring the beaver to you, large and small, male or female and castor does not attract otter. I like to place castor on the bank and keep the traps back from the lure, 5 to 50 feet usually, but I have sometimes had traps even farther from the lure depending on situation. Beaver will find it. The public won't find the castor sets either since there is no apparent rhyme or reason to what you have done, nothing obvious to find, no trail, no cross over, no castor mound either, just lure on the bank.

Well I would disagree on otter not being attracted to beaver castor.

I've caught otter using castor but I think it is the slide type Entrance/exit spot that may attract them. And when I say castor is Dobbins Back breaker. Maybe there's something else in it they're attracted too. Oh, and we're talking experience that counts beaver by the whopping dozens, so take my experience with a ounce of castor:)

Yes, I have caught one otter at a castor set, that I remember, in the past twenty something years where there seemed to be no reason that I could see for the otter to be attracted to site. The day, the set is a vivid memory. I remember being incredibly surprised. In that same time period I know I've taken 1000 beaver with castor, cages, snares, conibears and a footholds. The key was not setting at a beaver crawl out or anything either a beaver or otter had made, not setting on the dam corners or setting near or on otter toilets, but making the castor set in a secluded location in thick stuff unto itself, nothing open, so that only a beaver would be interested in it, and no mound either, just lure. The castor I used had no major additives, just castor with a few drops of whatever I had to enhance.

The other main element in otter avoidance is setting at dark just as the beaver emerge. In this way the beaver are the first critters to come to the site. Sets made at 8 p.m. or later in summer are likely to make a catch in a couple of hours or even as short as minutes, meaning that when a non-target does arrive at the site the trap already has a beaver in it. Castor sets are and can be made to be pretty much species specific. The idea in any beaver trapping to avoid otter is keep the number of sets down, use castor to bring the beaver to you and to catch the beaver as quickly as possible so that otter or others creatures have no time to reach traps. A pair of beaver can be taken in a few hours with but 2 sets. Late setting with few traps even helps with channel sets.

Additionally, if swim through cages are used with castor, with the traps set just above the water level a couple of inches, a live otter can be released. No matter what the targetted animal, its nice to be able to remove the problem critters while leaving the rest intact, as in positive sets for skunks, chucks etc. Nothing is perfect or foolproof, but you can bring the odds way down.

Avoid crossovers and other natural travel routes that both otter and beaver use,this includes bank holes and den holes and their runs.
Castor sets,set heavy and get the beaver and pull.The longer you leave sets,the more chance you have of catching an otter.Learn to identify dry land crossovers,and keep your castor sets away from these also.
Nothing is 100% but castor sets away from travel routes will be extremely low chance to catch otter.
Setting the triggers on your 330's off to the side will help you avoid otters and other non targets(not as effective with submerged traps).

Yes, time is of the essence, very important. The least amount of time sets are in at a given location, the better, fewest total trap nights. Dovetailing with cross over avoidance is trap theft. In secluded areas, no problem, but in urban /suburban sites, houses, people, a cross over set is easy to spot and what a trap thief looks for. During the off season if you are spotted by a trapper looking for trouble, he will easily find you on a dam or crossover. A short stay will diminish the chances of theft. Again, in a secluded area you can set crossovers with swim through cages just above the surface so that otter can be released.

Beaver floats can be a good thing (not exclusive as all beavers will not go in)

But I like to add them where people and dogs may be present as I can put them out away from shore
Like this

Or put them out in the thick stuff where there is no channels or dry area for a castor mound

This one worked two days ago

Again there are not the go to sets but they have there place

Good info.
I'm getting ready to make a beaver float (if I refine 1 & it works, I'll make a couple). Is any kind of straight solid dead tree (in the 3-5" thick range) effective for the frame?

I use 2X4 with a piece of 1" foam sandwiched between them, this give the cut out for the springs of the 330 also

Do you find a float works with various brands of body grips, or do you design it for 1 size/make/model?

The ones I have I built to fit my duke 330s

Can't imagine that there would be enough difference in others. I just slide the springs in to the sides.

I use Cronks #1 Beaver and usually get them first night, several times they have gone in the trap before I leave the site.

Castor is hard to beat. As long as the lure has castor in it, its a good lure. In summer if you were to arrive right before dark, set and stay for a bit you could probably go home with a catch or two or more within a few minutes. Just have to decide if it is worth a short wait. Now recall setting after dark one night right in front of a home. While talking to the home owners after setting I said, "I think I heard a coinibear go off." The woman said, "I think I heard two go off." Went down to check, found one swimming around, popped him with the .22 and then took the other two out of the traps. Setting, catching, shooting, remaking the sets took 45 minutes, went home with 3 beaver that night. If played correctly catching beaver in minutes can be more the norm rather than the exception. Always nice to break the ice with a catch or two right away, sometimes saves one or more trips.

Watch the new Billy the exterminator episode coming up. You'll be asked if you catch the beavers that way eventually.

Nearly fell off my chair when I saw the preview.

Is this going to be another reality show that is far from reality?

Show has been around for a while. Think Turtleman but with the looks of a punk rocker.

Nice catch. Is that trap in the last post (where you are standing in the water) one of your 18 x 12, or a smaller one?

Nice photos. You use bait in those cages Jim?

Looks like the 12 x 12'' Comstocks. Wire mesh is 1-1/2'' square. I've been real happy with my 12x12 Comstock traps.

Actually I haven't used bait or lure in the cages, though I know some who have. One trapper put poplar branches in a cage and caught a couple of beaver under ice nearly 7 years ago. I usually use the 12x18 for most locations, but do go both smaller and larger depending on circumstance, width of the run, sometimes using 12x12 or 12x15. The bottom trap is a 12x18. The top trap is larger, 14x22. I have used traps as wide as 24 for wide runs. One trapper in Iowa is using a few 15x24's since it covers such a large area without fencing or narrowing, drop and go.

A lured cage trap for beaver needs a minimum door height of 14" (from the bottom of the set door to the ground) and works best taller. The lured trap works best if at least 14" wide, the shorter the better. A lock bar door limits area inside the trap after the doors close. Also a swing bar trigger hinders the effectiveness of the trap when the trap is lured inside. It effects how the beaver works the set inside the trap.

I can show pictures and video to prove my point using the type of doors and traps mentioned above. I use them all.

A trap made to fit the requirements of a cage that can be baited, and can be used as a swim through in water or under water allows for more variety and set choices at catch locations, therefore increases the chance for a catch.

Two in the last three days in this float

Yesterday one had gone over the side of the float and must have slipped in to the water between the "castor mound" and the 330

Both caught are one year olds The are staking cattails on top of a drain

Castor sure is the ticket, while using just about any kind of beaver trap to go with it. Just have to use the traps and sets that run the best percentages with the fewest misses so you don't end up with wised up beaver, the biggest fear.

Sometimes I could choke the guy who made spell check when the computer picks a word you never wrote!

Yep. Sometimes it takes me twice as long to go back and fix it than I'd did thenorignal post

By the way Jim. That big ole 24X12 I bought from you at NTA convention in Kalamazoo has paid for its self. So every beaver from this point forward is profit.

Also caught : turtles, bullheads and muskrats in it

Maybe if you used another trap you could avoid turtles, bullheads, and muskrats making your days on the job more profitable. It all gets back to design. If you never used one how would you know?

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Maybe if you used another trap you could avoid turtles, bullheads, and muskrats making your days on the job more profitable. It all gets back to design. If you never used one how would you know?
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I've caught turtles, carp and muskrats in 330s also

Don't believe that there is any trap that will not on an occasion catch a nontarget

Michigan Trappin is on the money. There are no traps or sets completely immune to non-target catches. The type of sets you make have a great deal to do with catching non-targets, placement, location. Different baits and lures. Castor sets for beaver in out of the way places as well as positive sets for skunks and chucks at den sites greatly reduce non wanted animals, not reducing it to zero, but running a very low percentage, which is all you can expect.

Yep. Location location. Set and bait/lure

In that comstock all those non targets came on the same job when I blind set a channel

That was a public park

Returned to the same park for another go and just trapped it for the last month. I did zero sets in that channel and I was a little more discerning on my locations. Used the comstock and 330s. Caught 13 beaver and ZERO non-targets in one month of trapping

Doing ADC vs Fur trapping will mean a different type or amount of non-targets to avoid. For example I have only ever caught one turtle while fur trapping. That was this late winter when we had a big warm up

Same with how trigger wires are set. I have a feeding den used by both beaver and rats and for some reason the miss' of the landowner does not want me catching rats. So a good bend of the wire and the dog set to the side. And I get beavers and no rats


DEKIRK Not saying you don't have a trap that not good bad or ugly. I honestly know nothing about you or your traps. Just saying and agreeing with Jim that methods probably mean more to missing non-targets than any trap design that I HAVE SEEN

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Maybe you missed what was stated earlier. Especially the last sentence of what I said.

Very nice float for beaver can be found on youtube. Just type in beaver float dimensions. Just set my first one and got my first beaver on the first check. Floats very well. The only way I adjusted the trap was I used 4 nails to hold the trap on the top rather than the holder from FnT.

I have some wood drying in the garage that I cut to make a float. I heard the 4 nail option is the way to go.

I haven't caught a turtle yet, but probably will. I worry more about an incidental otter.

Any tips on getting that last dominant female beaver? Castor mounds haven't worked, shy of 330s and probably pregnant. Any tips appreciated

330 set on bottom in a deep channel.

I have had good success using the castor from another beaver caught at the same location. Just finishing a beaver job where I had two beaver leave toenails in a trap. Caught them both a week later in the same sets using the castor from the first beaver that I caught there. One in a MB750 and one snared at a castor mound high up on a bank.