Ok usually beavers are a nuisance but in this case they built their dam at the end of a wetland on my mothers property and made a pond. My mom loves it and the beavers but she wouldn't mind if the standing dead trees were removed. There are at least two huts and thedam has been there a few years.
Anywho today I took the tractor down there and cut some of the dead maple and ash for firewood which split right up as it was so dry. All well and good but in the process I skimmed over the ice with my snow blade and snapped off a bunch saplings right at the ice/waterline to get at the trees. I could bunch them up and burn them right on the ice or just leave them, but what is best for the beaver?
Just leave the branches. The beavers would love it if you would drag in a freshly cut poplar top ;D
Our beavers eat the green (fresh) bark from the trees and limbs. I have not seen them have any interest in dead stuff.
I think sprucebunny is right, and a poplar top :D :D they would eat on that a long time :) :)
Don't know if I have any poplar around here...they seem to like quaking aspen though......
then bring them a quaking aspen top :) :D :)have fun
Beavers will cut saplings and "plant" them underwater, where they can get at them in the winter for food (they'll swim under the ice and grab them to bring back to the lodge). If some of those saplings were near the lodge, it's possible you were just shaving off the tops of saplings they'd already cut.
I made a point to stay away from the lodges as I don't want to bug them and the water is pretty open there already. The saplings are standing dead from before the area was flooded....I just may drop a tree or two for the beaves....
They will come out of the lodge onto land in a mild spell and cut saplings and stuff. The ponds around here don't seem to freeze up, always open water in areas. The things flood a lot of acres. On my cousin they flooded out a nice stand of regenerated cedar that was getting about 12 feet tall. Probably 10 acres. The beavers made a brook out of an area that was just mostly seepage fed. The place was full of big old cedar 14-20" stuff. It was cut, now the beavers have a new brook and pond. :D
If you do hurt those, beavers, let me know. Then, you can come down here and hurt some for me :). They can be major pests and destroy acres of valuable timber (which they have already done on some of my property).
I would not worry about fissing off those DanG beavers they wrote the book on persistance.Just do what you need to do they will handle the rest. Frank C.
I have to get a local trapper to come to my place each year. He will thin them down, but they can not be eliminated. :-\
Quote from: Magicman on January 23, 2012, 09:16:37 AM
I have to get a local trapper to come to my place each year. He will thin them down, but they can not be eliminated. :-\
We've found all we can do is control them for a short time. They back water over tile outlets, and sometimes damage the stream banks. If trees are not available, they are most happy to use corn stalks, or even soybeans. I never saw a beaver before the mid 70's, though. They were almost wiped out in Indiana for a long time.
I thought deer could damage corn until the beavers showed up in a stream next to a couple of fields I farm. They decided that corn stalks were much easier to make a dam out of.
Watch your mouth, Norm! The cornstalks were much easier to make a DanG out of ;D ;D ;D
I have to fight the beavers here every year. The river brings a new batch of them each spring, each spring I get a new box of lead for the lead pusher and pratice the aim.
Back around August 84 or 85, grandfather and I were off to a fishing trip. But just up the road at the hydro dam we found two road kill beaver that got run down that night. We took them to his brother's where he skinned and sowed up the rips in the fur from being run over. He used floss for this and worked it into the fat/skin in the hide to hide it from view. Real skillful. He kept the pelts in the freezer until fall for the fur trade where he sold the pelts. One for $200 and the other $220. This is why there are so many beaver now, no market or price is to low. No one trapping them. It's like selling any commodity. Need a good price and market. That'll clean up the beavers. Oh well, when the oil dries up them beavers will come in handy. ;) :D
They have undermined one of my creek banks and I am going to have to rebuild/relocate my largest bridge. :-\
Never fear, the beaver can survive. We have a beaver lodge by a utilty pole, the beaver chipped into this pole about a third through. Thanks to the guy wires the pole hasn't fell...yet.
Then, the next little trick they did was knaw through pine knots on a board walk out to a floating boat dock. [otter feeding station now]
We also had a bunch of beaver to suddenly, after thirty years of no damage, began chewing on old willow trees, it appeared as to sharpen their teeth, they never cut any of them down. Trapped several 50 pounders that year.
Beavers are attracted to the sound of running water when their dams are messed with. Remove a few sticks in the late afternoon and apply high speed lead poisoning when they show up to do repair work.
I with Corley with the high speed method of applying insentive to control damages. :)
I rigged up a 16' lake boat with 20h. merc and installed a middlebuster plow in front of the bow with sturdy braces. We have wide canal-like ditches around here; the beaver would build dams about every three hundred yards.
I'd crank up, get a full throttle running start and ram through the dams, sometimes it would take two or three 'rams' to break through but then was fun to ride the 'tidal wave' on down to the next dam. After the initial dam-breaking we would police the canal with a routine run-through every three or four days, much easier but less fun ;D