First I want to say that I understand if this post is removed because it is too gruesome for the anti's and I don't want it used for propaganda but I am having a problem.

I am new to beaver trapping but have done plenty of reading, research and have watched a pile of videos.

I have three castor mound sets out that I am using a 12' long cable with a 10 lb. weight on one end, with the other end staked at a mound with castor in tubing for lure. I am using a Duke#4 4 coiled, a foot of chain with 2 swivels, set 18 inches from the mound. and plenty of guiding. I keep the pan somewhat loose because I read on here that pans on water sets should have a little more movement.

I have had these sets out for two nights and they are getting hit every night. The problem I am having is that instead of swimming out and drowning these things are banking themselves breaking their legs and twisting them off. I have had two on the same set on back to back nights do this leaving me with a front beaver digger in the trap. I caught another that drowned on another set that the leg was broken and ripped open, but no evidence of twisting. These have all been front foot catches and the beaver are 45lb. plus judging by their paws.

My questions are:
Is this something that has happened to anyone else?
Could the Duke 4x4 be too much trap for them and be the cause of the broken legs?
Should I tighten up the pan or move the trap further away to try for a rear foot?
What are the odds of these things surviving?, I scoured the accessible banks and didn't find them.

Thanks in advance for any advice or ideas.

First off, 10 pounds isn't enough weight. Double it, or more.
Second, what sort of lock are you using? And is it going "the right direction"?

You do not mention where the weight is after the catch but a 10lb weight is not sufficient to drown a beaver in most cases.

The beavers first response to to danger or the trap firing is to dive. You need to make sure your cable rig is set up to allow them to dive without getting tangled and you have to have enough weight or sufficient staking of the bottom end to keep them down there. You also need enough water depth to do the job. You do not need as much water for a front foot as a back but remember that the chain length needs to be figured into the amount of water required. Shorter chain is better.

Sounds like your setup is either not getting them down the cable or is not keeping them down or does not have enough water depth to finish the job.

You are getting them caught fine but now you have a couple of educated beaver that will be hard to catch. Probably going to have to change methods and body grip or snare them in blind sets.

One of the first things Paul Dobins taught me 15 years ago was to use four or 5 pounds pan tension and I would triple the weight

Are these front foot wring offs or hind foot wring offs?

-L style locks that are homemade from 1x1x1/8" angle, and seem to work really good and are pointed the right way.
-Water depth at the weight is at least 2' at the shallowest trap.

I am seeing that weight is probably the issue. These guys seem to want to bank themselves first and if they can pull that weight in a foot they can get up there and start rolling.

So I am looking at:
-giving them more pan tension at least 5 pounds
-double or triple weight to 20 to 30 lbs.
-and double check my locks are working correctly and not straightening out or deforming

Thanks for the quick replies and patience, I'll be going back out in a couple hours to rectify everything.

With a foot of chain on the trap and 2 feet of water, you are not going to drown many adult beaver. You need to find deeper water to drown the quickly. The longer they can fight, the more likely they are to escape.

And good luck trying to catch them again using the same method.

Your drowner cable has to be tight and unmovable, I have caught a couple front feet, I would say you need to set the weight, I use 2 cinder blocks, in about 3 to 4 feet of water. Distance between trap and drowned cable connection also needs to be about 9 inches or less, you have to "short leash"" them, and drown quickly. It's gotta be a one way trip to Davey Jones locker. Also your trap jaws may need filing down on the edges so they don't cut into that front foot, causing a break. I personally like offset jaws for this reason. I have gone back to areas where I caught a foot a year ago and trapped 3 legged ones..the front foot hole was healed over.
Good trapping and hope ya get em..

Front foot or back foot?

Beav- These have both been front foot wring offs.

AIX-Good to know I was going to use rebar drowning stakes but have a long way to travel through the woods so I sat here a home and premade my sets with cable so they each fit in a bucket that I can carry back to the location. I guess I'll be adding a lot more weight and will be getting strong by the end of season, LOL! I'll be tightening the pan up too.

QBD-Thought about it again and your right, I have one set that is that shallow, it is the one that seemed to work as planned though, I'll be moving it to deeper water for future catches though.

Rosscoak- Good to know that they will survive it. I love to hunt and trap and it always makes me heartsick when a wounded one gets away. I'll look in to cutting a couple links out of the chain too.

WOW! that is all a lot of good info, looks like I'll be going out and modifying everything A-Z, I'll be glad to know that I am doing it right in the end though!

I have killed a lot of beaver In 2' of water. I prefer 4' but you deal with what you have.
In my opinion you need a weight as close to the trap as you can get It. 5lbs Is enough. Even a big beaver In 2' of water Is going to wear down pretty quick with 5lbs of weight hanging on It's foot.
I trapped a major river here In WI. Our drowning rig was a steel fence post and 10 feet of chain and a tie plate or a window weight attached to the trap chain.
The beavers first inclination Is to head for the water. It gets to the stake and gets wrapped up It can't get back to shore. Fighting that weight soon tires It out and It's lights out.
The biggest problem we had was by driving the stake In the water created a eddy and that formed a sand bar. And a beaver wrapped up around the stake was even worse. Lost a few beaver and traps do to that set up. They were completely buried by a sand bar.

I'm betting If you had a weight attached to the trap your loses would be a lot less. Stake your system as deep as you can then use that 10LB weight at the trap and see how that works.

Or give up the foot holds and use 330s.

Beav- I would love to use more 330's, but PA law restricts us to a total of 20 traps statewide, only 2 can be 330's, 8 can be footholds, and 10 can be snares. I have snares and 330's set on all the accessible runs and troughs between a series of 6 ponds and have only had one 330 catch. That's why I decided on some castor mound sets with footholds, I only have 3 out because that's all I could find in stock locally, I'll be getting more before the end of season. I see what your saying about attaching a weight directly to the trap. I'll be trying a couple different sets to see what works best for me.

AIX- I'll see what I can do about staking the deep end, all your suggestions are good, and are the smarter not harder approach.

Your problem is the weight. If all you have is ten pounds at the end, the beaver has no trouble moving that around and the weight actually is causing the leg to break. Attaching weight to the trap won't help if the beaver doesn't drown, but will only make things worse. Beaver fight the trap very hard at first and pulling all that weight around by a front leg is what is giving you the problem, increasing the weight will only make things worse. You'd be better off with no weight at all. You either have to add weight to the end so the beaver can't move it around, (at least 45 pounds) or get rid of the weight all together and "live chain" them.

Pan tension has no bearing at all, unless you want to totally eliminate front foot catches. #4 traps aren't fool proof by any means with hind feet either, big beaver have big feet and there's not much room for error. And unless you have 4' or more of water, it's going to take a while for a beaver to expire when rear foot caught, making escape more likely.

I prefer front foot catches with #3 and #4 sized traps. If you have at least 2 1/2' of water and the beaver can't come up for air or get back to the bank, a front foot caught beaver will be there when you return.

How many swivels were on that chain

I long chain mine, no weight, except the trap.
I've trapped beaver since 1987.
I've never toed or footed a beaver, ever !

I disagree on the weight Issue at the trap.
Take a good swimmer and tie a 5 or 10lb weight to his foot or hand and see how quick he tires out and goes down. It's the same with a beaver. You just need lots of swiveling action between the trap and the weight.
But I would be staking the deep end.
Then what about all these beaver trappers that advocate staking on dry ground and just let the beaver lay on the bank and take a nap? No entanglement small traps and plenty of swivels?

But its the weight on the trap that is causing the leg damage Beav. I'm betting it happens within the first minute the beaver is caught and before it ever has a chance to drown. They thrash around violently when first caught(seen it first hand many times) and all that weight is putting a lot of pressure on the front leg. Grab a trap and swing your arm, not much pressure. Attach ten pounds to a trap and swing it and the pressure increases dramatically.

I didn't find It to be that way with my system. But I was just long chaining them so they weren't fighting a fixed system and I always set for a hind leg.
But If the trap Is getting all the way to the deep end that could be the case. So to correct this situation and I've preached this before. You need to put a stop on your system so the trap dosen't get to that deep end weight. Now It's not getting tangled In the staking system and getting some leverage.
I've killed a lot of beaver In shallow water as long as there not getting to the deep end stake or getting back on shore.

Iv'e used sash weights before on long chains and the biguns are still on the bank. So i quite using weights, long chains except for close to bridgers. Swivels are the answer and a strong trap on 6 foot or more chain. At bridges I use rerod drowning rods and lots of swivels. No twist outs for years..
4-6 pounds pan tension makes a big difference too..

When I long chained and used the weights I was using a steel fence post at the deep end. Never had a beaver on the bank.
We worked out Of a boat so weight wasn't a Issue and I was forty. LOL

I often times find a strong stick from the dam,10 foot long or long enough to reach deep enough water.tie the drownder wire on the big end and jam it into the bottom,drive a stake to attach other end of drownder wire,dont let stake stick up to high so the beaver doesn't wrap around it.then wire the stick to the same stake.if you catch one,unwire stick and pull the beaver out.i use swivels for drownder lock,feed the wire from the inside.

Do you have to drown them ? Theirs a few guys who just long chain em and let them swim.mihjt be something to look into

Well , I changed two of them out tonight. I changed the locks to some I made today, I didn't think of using the swivels but now that I think about it I bet they would work pretty well.

I over doubled the weight on the end to far end to 22.5 on one and 25 on the other. I found out the hard way that the banks are way too steep to get in there and stake anything. Everything around here was stripped in the 70's so they are steep stripping cuts. The weights I am using are lifting weights and some are chrome plated, some are painted silver, once the silt settles they looks like they are right there at 3-4 feet but they are in fact about 5-7 foot deep.

I forgot my chain cutters today so I wasn't able to shorten the chain or add a swivel but I will when I check tomorrow morning.
We got a pile of rain here around noon and the first river I drive across rose about a foot and the second one would have been impassable so hopefully it will settle over night so I can get to the rest of the traps or I'll be going an alternate route that is double the distance on worse roads.
Thanks again for all of the info!

The only thing that makes me nervous about this is that both times I found the wring outs, the trap was sitting on the bank with the beaver paw in it. The chain wasn't twisted over itself like it would because of lack of swivels. The weight was still in the water, once it was only pulled in about a foot the other time in about 3 foot. So it seemed like it used the bulk of the trap on the ground in order to twist off. So really I want them in the water where they have less traction to roll around and wring out.

More weight and super tight cables. As far as too much trap, a lot of trappers use MB-750's for beaver which is a powerhouse.

I always use a positive drowning system when using footholds for beaver.

I understand the long chain theory but the typical beaver habitat that I deal with is not conducive to long chaining. There is always entanglement and if they are front foot caught and get the chain tangled anywhere but in deep water, it is bad news.

I understand more weight is better and I have more weight to put on them all. It's just I can only carry so much along with my tools so I went ahead and split the weight among two sets that I have in the same area. I have an additional 50lbs. loaded in the truck for tomorrow. All I have to do to add weight is pull the stake open the J hook, remove the trap from the lock and drop more weight on and lift the cable so it slides to the bottom. It is a lot to carry but I have plans on caching some of it in a couple brush piles for future use.
I tried to see if I could stake the far end but it is way too deep, so for now I am kind of committed to this set up until I get some time to recon some shallower and easy to access areas. For now I am fairly confident I am on some areas that haven't been trapped in a while.

Believe me fella's I am trying to heed y'alls advice that's why I asked for it, But I can only follow so much advice at one time. One guy says shorten the chain another says long chain, some things I can't do in the area I am in. All advice is good and welcome, especially for a fairly new trapper like me. But some of it I'll have to try one idea at a time.

That's my preferred method on carry in beaver sets long chains 6-7' and stake them 4-5' off bank then another stake 6-7 " off bank keeping them swimming the entire time most times they are wrapped around the deeper stake tangled and drown. Attach the trap chain low on the first stake so when they go round and round it reels them in. The bottom of your water way plays the biggest part on the weight on your drowner anchor. Rocky bottoms once they get it rolling across the rocks its on bank fast. Silt mud is just as bad. Unless you literally walk out and plant it in the mud its going to move! lol I had a 60 lb beaver moving two concrete blocks so fast thru the water it was making wake. sorry that one was on a snare. Then I went to entanglement for snares problem solved no more live beavers waiting on me

I always stake the deep end with a dry 1in diameter spruce or tamarak pole.If the water is 10 foot deep cut a 15 foot pole.I don't need to get in the water to stake the deep end,using a long pole you stake the deep end right from the bank.There is no way I am going to haul a bunch of 40lb weights or heavy re-bar into the backcountry.Of course if you have a rocky bottom,staking wont work,but a roll of chickenwire works to bag up some rocks for an on site drowning weight in those cases.
If you are trapping roadside out of a vehicle,then you can haul weight if you want to.

Lot of good info here, but I will agree with the beav. I have caught a few beaver and never had a bad problem with 15 to 20 pound at the end of the chain.

From what you described, any chance the beaver had some help?

A lot depends on the bottom structure. There are places where 10lbs of weight will just about be impossible to retrieve.

About 1/2 the beaver on a long chain will be drown and half on the bank asleep or bobbing like a cork.
Contact me on FB and I'll show you some pics.
I have no idea how to post them on T-Man anymore

LT theres an app called IMGUR that you can download pics from better than photobucket.

postimage.org is also very similar to photobucket and works also.

But the simplest way I have found is to use the photo uploader on here. It is the block with the blue arrow pointing up. The only problem is that there is a size limit on the picture. Must be less than 2.09 MB each. Most good quality phones and digital cams are bigger than that so the pics have to be resized. But that is easier and faster than using a hosting site.

To resize: Right click the picture and select properties to see how big it is so you can determine how much you need to reduce it. Close that box and right click it again and select Open With Paint. This open a window that allows you to resize by percentage. If the pic was 4MB before, type in 50% and it should be small enough to post. Then save the picture. I usually keep the original full size and change the name of the smaller one by adding a-1 or something similar to the end of the filename.

Once you have it resized and renamed, go back to your forum post and put your cursor where you want the picture and click on the blue up arrow box and follow the instructions.

It took me a lot longer to type this than it takes to resize and upload the pic to a post.

Yotetrapper30 (Angela) posted this a long time ago and IMO, it is much simpler and quicker than any of the 3rd party sites.

I know this works well on a Windows laptop or PC. Not sure about tablets and smart phones and apple products.

get rid of those footholds and go with all snares. Put them on enough chain/cable to be able to reach both land/water. They will not fight near as much. The whole beaver will be there waiting for you.

I saw this mentioned once in the posts but if you have a long way to go you should consider poly sacks you can buy em at Agway for about .50 cents. Carry em in empty and fill em up
when you get to the site. I think weight is your answer I too learned the hard way about that a few years ago. You cant have too much weight but 10lbs is not enough. If you cant drown em snares is the way to go. Light very versatile they don't spook the beaver and typically they will be waiting for you when you get there.