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Modern ee Methods 
Where and How to Set Traps—Part Eleven 
Beaver Habits. 
W JHEREVER you see a place 
where beavers have wintered 
it’s a good thing to make a set 
there anyway, for even if the original 
owners have left there temporarily, 
other beavers may happen along and, 
seeing the dams and lodge, investigate. 
At this time the use of some powerful 
attractor is very necessary and there 
is nothing to compare with the genuine 
beaver castor, taken from the animal 
by the trapper himself and used while 
fresh. 
Contrary to a general belief, the cas- 
tors are not male sex organs but are 
found on the female as well. They 
are two in number, being elongated 
sacs containing a yellowish secretion, 
and are located where one would natu- 
rally expect to find sex glands on the 
male—hence the erroneous idea. In 
connection with the castors are the oil 
sacs, often used by the trapper for 
making scents, but not especially valu- 
able in beaver trapping. The manner 
of using the castor is simple. A small 
stick is split and a piece of the stuff 
cut up and forced in the split. The 
stick is stuck in the mud alongshore, 
so the scented portion of it will hang 
over the trap. Sometimes it may be 
rubbed against a tree, leaving enough 
scent to lure the beaver. On small 
streams a good set, baited with the cas- 
tor, will stop most any beaver that hap- 
pens along. Because the beavers wan- 
der so much in spring time it is very 
necessary to have some sort of set that 
will attract his attention wherever he 
passes by, and without this scent the 
trapper would be up against it. A 
pocket dug in the bank, deep enough 
so the trap will be a few inches under 
water, makes a good set when the cas- 
tor is used. 
One of the old, old sets which has 
By RAYMOND THOMPSON 
accounted for thousands upon thou- 
sands of beavers, is this: A _ small 
break is made in the dam and two or 
three traps set slightly to one or both 
sides of the break. The beavers will 
attempt to repair the dam and one at 
least should get caught. But occasion- 
ally you will run across a trapwise old 
beaver who will give you a run for 
your money. When you make the break 
in his dam he will drag brush and mud 
over your traps, often burying them 
with a foot or more of muck. I have 
trapped dozens of such beavers. Some- 
times they will climb up over the dam 
and attempt to mend the break from 
the lower side. 
But the smartest beaver may be 
fooled if one goes about it intelligently 
and has time to spare; providing, of 
course, Old Castor doesn’t paddle off to 
parts unknown when things get too 
warm for him. The main secret is 
this: leave no sign or human scent. If 
you walk along a shore, leaving tracks 
in the mud and making all kinds of 
signs where you make the set, the 
beaver will know just as well what has 
been going on as if you had marked the 
exact location of the traps with a red 
flag. 
UT if, on the other hand, you wade 
in the water and make your sets 
without so much as touching the shore 
or brush that grows along it, placing 
your trap under water and making no 
disturbance of the natural surround- 
ings whatever, old Flat-Tail is sure go- 
ing to be fooled. 
But how can a man wade in water 
five or six feet deep, you ask? Or how 
can a wilderness trapper pack heavy 
rubber boots around with him? Impor- 
tant questions, you bet! But where 
there’s a will there’s a way. Most 
streams where beavers are fairly plen- 
tiful have a considerable amount of 
water in them and the ponds often ex- 
tend over a large amount of territory. 
OME of the very best sets are out 
in the center of these ponds, where 
small islands have been left undis- 
turbed by the beavers, affording con- 
venient feeding grounds. It is pat- 
ently out of the question for the north 
country trapper to pack a boat along 
with him. But an expert woodsman 
can build a raft large enough for the 
purpose in a couple of hours. Time 
and again the writer has built a raft 
for the express purpose of trapping 
beavers or ’rats. If you catch but one 
large beaver the time expended is noth- 
ing in comparison to the reward. 
Beaver trapping is hard work and the 
harder you work the more it will pay. 
A good trapper will locate a beaver 
colony, build a small raft, make eight 
or ten GOOD sets and get half of the 
beavers the first night or two, while 
an amateur will monkey around, catch 
one or two beavers and wise the rest 
so that he won’t be able to get any 
more if he stays there the rest of the 
season. With a raft you can make sets 
in natural places, leaving absolutely 
no sign of your visitation and fool the 
biggest buck beaver that ever felled a 
poplar. And, as I hinted, two hours 
work is nothing in a trapper’s day. 
The proper use of some drowning 
set is absolutely necessary if one would 
make a success of beaver trapping. 
The forefoot of the beaver is small and 
the wrist or ankle very slight in pro- 
portion to the great strength of the 
animal. If caught in a trap fastened 
by ordinary methods, the animal will 
soon wring his foot off and escape. The 
writer has caught beavers that had 
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