Has anyone ever gotten sick from eating beaver meat? I ate some and fed it to the family tonight but for some reason now I'm paranoid.

I've eaten a fair amount if It over the years and my buddy eats a LOT of it. Never had any issues.

I've about killed a dog or two feeding them muskrat, though.

Why did it almost kill the dog?

Eating beaver has never phased me. I quite enjoy it.

I thought it tasted great. I just got paranoid about possible parasites or something.

I've never heard of anyone getting sick from eating beaver meat.

I am also interested in why muskrat might be hard on dogs. Same reason perhaps that a man cant survive on snowshoe hare for too long ?

Calvin was talking muskrat. My uncle feeds his dogs beaver all winter. Never had a problem. He does use supplements/dog food of some kind occasionally so they get some other nutrients.

I have corrected my post, I meant muskrat.

After handling them for months and everything has that beaver smell the last thing I wanted to do was eat one!

I have never been that hungry. But, of all the things I trap, beaver is highest on the list of critters I would eat, and fairly easy to come by. We live in a great country filled with pork, beef, and chicken. What more can I say .

x2

Here is my beaver smoked sausage. 100 percent beaver meat and fat. Polish seasoning and 3.5 hours of smoke. Quite possibly the best sausage i have ever eaten.

X3

I'll take beaver over venison any day. To me beaver tastes like veal and has triple the omega 3's (over beef or pork) and no fat.

But back to the question of whether you can get sick eating beaver: Yes! YOU CAN. The Malade (french for sickness) river in Idaho is named that because a group of Hudson Bay trappers got sick eating beaver flesh on its banks. The issue was that the beaver had been feeding on water hemlock which grew rampantly along its banks and had a sub-lethal amount of poisonous alkaloids built up in their flesh.

We eat it in my house. Well all but the wife. My 2 girls eat it in hamburgers and my oldest doesn't like beef hamburgers at all but will eat 2 beaver burgers in a sitting. Haven't got sick or any adverse effects from eating it.

I've always it eat it but never got sick, I have heard the story about the trappers in Idaho I had forgot about that!
Colt

we like the loins.

I have mix grounded beaver with high fat grounded beef.1/2 and 1/2 and you would find it is better then one think.Have use it to make meat ball for a family reunion and all the ones that ate it came back for more.Since beaver is so lean and the fat from the low grade beef make up for it and you do not have hardly any fat left. I also use the beaver for lunch meat also.

The primary risk I'm aware of is giardia, AKA beaver fever. As long as you cooked the meat well there's no worries.

That looks tasty! Can you ship to Kansas? Lol

One of my fellow workers (I gave him the beaver). Said that "he cut the backstraps & upchucked shortly after eating there after". I felt bad about that because, I feel it was in his mind & that's a powerful organ.

2nd

The best part is the liver. Beaver liver and onions YUM YUM.

I've had beaver several times. Its good but you have to cook it well done. No blood remaining. They can have Trichinosis. Just like hogs did years ago. Bears can have it too.

Brad

X2 teepee!

About a dozen of you have misread the earlier post Calvin made about nearly killing his dog feeding it muskrat. I wondered why that might be .

Wy did the rats almost kill his dogs?
Never heard of that one, I've eat a bunch of rats my self, old people I grew up around lived on rats and fish of course we're river people!

Wy did the rats almost kill his dogs?
Never heard of that one, I've eat a bunch of rats my self, old people I grew up around lived on rats and fish of course we're river people!

I don't think a rat or beaver hurts a dog to eat them, but their pharts can smell like they died!
Dennis

I used to provide beaver carcasses for a rancher's border collies and one of his dogs got stopped up with an intestinal bulge of beaver bone and undigested flesh. He cured that with a hose and warm water enema after getting a nearly $1000 estimate from the local vet for surgery.

My border collies can't hardly wait for trapping season and have never had a problem.

Beaver meat is a wonderful food. I barbeque it sliced into strips 1\2 inch thick X 1\2 inch wide rolled in seasoning then wrapped in bacon. Do this on tin foil so everything stays in the bacon fat. I have taken this to pot-luck dinners. I swear people go nuts over this and keep coming back for more.

That looks great, I bet it tastes even better.

you forgot walleye les

I've had beaver a time or two. I think it is very tasty. I eat more if I lived in an area that had a lot of beavers. Never had any ill affects.

I have no idea. It's happended a couple times now. Always fresh muskrats. Never had it happen with beaver, though. My dogs have eaten lots and lots of beaver.

^^Hopefully not to the same dog?

Both Beaver And Muskrat As Well As Varying Hare Can Carry Tularemia.

This Disease Can Be Fatal To Man And Other Mammals.

w

If dogs eat only beaver or muskrat for long periods of time when kenneled up they often get hotspots in their fur . just the same as when your dog food is to high protein .

I ate a lot of beaver back east out here it has a bitter taste I think they eat too much willow , the same smell would be in beaver meat that were eating a lot of water lilly tubers. I've found that bobcats and cougars really like beaver so pancho comes up short!

My half chihuahua half pomeranian will jump over a Tbone steak to get to muskrat. She especially loves the front feet. She will eat all the front feet off 20 ‘rats if I gave her that much. Sounds like shes eating fritos crunching them claws.

All my dogs love beaver hind feet. Border collie prefers to bury them for a few weeks to tenderize if she has enough for immediate needs.

What about eating beaver meat in the summer months, would the meat still be ok as long as it's good good.