I just read on a Cathryn’s 55 pounds of castor post that the comment was made that Paul prefers southern castor to northern for Backbreaker. I know the scent changes for family to family but I didn’t know that there was that much difference between north and south, so my question is what is the difference?

All in the beavers diet.

I dont know why but I know Paul wants southern for Backbreaker.

Ive heard that northern castor works for predator lure but that hands down it southern castor alk the way for affective beaver lures and we all know Backbreaker is the best beaver lure out there so I think Paul knows what hes doing.

UpstateNY, that makes a lot of sense. Cathryn, yes all I use is Backbreaker I just never thought that there would be that much difference until the diet was brought up it made me think that at least in Iowa beaver can get grains pretty easily where as the pictures I’ve seen of southern habitats its mainly trees and different trees at that.

Hopefully Paul will post.

I make and use my own lure from northern castor and the northern beaver love it. Can't say about the southern beaver, but I have alot of confidence in my lure and would not be afraid to use it anywhere.

Since I'm a skinflint and don't like to use up my valuable castor making lure one of the things I do is just trade mud
pies. Works great and they're free for the taking.

The point being my local castor works great for catching the local beavers.

Aspen makes a sweeter flesh colored castor but willow makes more orange with a bit of a sour smell to it! My main beaver lure come from MI UP castors and it works everyplace I have used it.

I tried some Backbreaker here in the north and it works equally as well as Bob Wilsons,which is a great beaver lure here in the North.I make some of my own from very old local recipe which also works great.But like BP I find it more cost effective to sell castor and buy lure.

Southern beaver's have pine sap in theirs is what makes it better, lol.

Does that make the smell "stick" around longer?

LOL, southern beaver's preferred diet is mainly sweet gum. They'll also eat on pine, willow, maple, merkle, and aquatic vegetation in the warmer months. The preferred diet for the northern beaver is aspen aka popple. This gives the castor a very different smell than what the southern beaver's diet gives. If I use northern castor in Backbreaker, it smells different and the trapper thinks something's wrong with the lure. It will work, but tests have shown that southern castor in Backbreaker works slightly better everywhere.

That kind of talk just makes me want to go south with my northern castor lure and show you all how to trap properly, lol.

Come on down!

I'm gonna, one of these days. I think I'll take on ice out beaver here first thing in April, first. lol.

I have had real good northern beaver castor that I mixed outside in temps -20 below zero temps , that Castor paste was slapping me in the nostrils as I mixed it up with a putty knife two feet + from my nostrils , that WAS DARN GOOD Northern beaver castor ! I was talking with Ardel Grawe about this Castor a few years back , he said were did you get it ! I told him, It was Really Good Northern Sweet Piercing Beaver Castor .

In some Southern States there is some decent beaver castor , sweet gum trees is one , there are other gum trees also they favor .

But I have Never had ANY Southern Beaver Castor that rose to the level of that batch of Very piercing Sweet Northern beaver castor as the batch I had at -20 below zero that I was mixing , by itself . That Northern Beaver Castor Reminded of the 'Ole Musk Tonquin Auth. Materials of the 1970's, 1980's from when Nick Wyshinski sold that Grade Top Grade , Amazingly Sweet Piercing Northern Beaver Castor . Just Amazing . Like to have a Dump truck load of that Grade Now , I am Ready for it .

Washington state castor has a sweet smell to it. I would describe the Southern castor in Backbreaker as spicy. I've opened a jar of both for people and even a non trapper will say they are notably different.

There’s a big noticeable difference in smell and color between eastern and western Kentucky. Here they eat mostly trees and in West Kentucky I think there’s quite a bit more weeds and vines. It has a yellowish color and smells like manure when first ground but comes around after mixing in and works great in eastern Ky.

Here in KS they eat a lot of corn. Anyplace corn is up against a creek or river with beaver they cut circles. Perfect circles with about a 8 - 10 foot radius. I don't have a clue how they cut them so perfectly round. Still a lot of people around here who don't know what is doing it. They eat a lot of willow. Young cottonwoods and soft maple about big around as your wrist seem to be preferred also. Pretty common to see any low hanging limb of willow cottonwood or soft maple get debarked in high water. Out poking around with my grandson we found a stick house . Don't see that here to often its almost always bank dens. Low beaver prices are allowing them to overpopulate again. I don't have time to ADC them but if prices stay down another couple years there will be a big demand for it.

Castor may smell different from different areas but its still castor and it still gets critters to want a nice sniff and face rub. Coyotes like to pee after they get their castor fix.

They do the same with corn here Danny, I like how they go in 5 or 6 rows then start cutting so you drive by and have no clue your field is being 'hollowed' out, lol. Feral hogs do the same thing, never start eating at the edge.

Yes peeler, this pine sap castor sticks around for month's, lol.

I get different castor from individual beavers even on the same stretch of river. My river beaver near where I live are into willow, poplar, and blackberry roots. I get over to the coastal lakes and their staple is lily rhizomes. Castors are smaller over there and the effluent is clear-to orange.

Mostly mustard yellow where they're into poplar and willow.

Well I guess the beavers in southeast Virginia are just too close to the Mason-Dixon line to eat sweet gum, let alone prefer it. I have trapped them year round for 20 years here and all I have ever seen them do to a sweet gum is girdle them, seemingly to just take them out of the gene pool in favor of the other species you have listed. I'd like to hear from other trappers in southeast Virginia about their observations with beaver and sweet gum trees. I have trapped from Virginia Beach to Greensville County.

Privet hedge crap is their main diet here in winter, rest of the year it's grass/weeds.

This is making sense most of the beaver here eat grains but as for trees its ash and popular mainly, the only thing is the ones I’ve removed are bright gray to silver and the size is comparable to a 400 pound steers testicles, and doesn’t really change according to the size of the beaver. Danny it seems here the beaver work outside in on cornfields, but the ones I’ve personally seen have a 50 foot grass strip for the ditch bank and maybe they are just running out and getting what they can as fast as they can to get back to the water.

Bob_Iowa, around here all the creeks and rivers have heavy timber along the banks. The row crops are right against the timber. Beaver don't need to cross but a few feet of open ground. lots of times its to narrow for even a pickup.

Ok the rivers here are that way but the creeks we drive along them most of the time, until you have a year like the last one and its a half mile walk in and a half mile out and then go around the section and do it again. That’s part of the reason I still use blocks and chains vs. rebar for droweners.

Great post! I love all castor. Just watching Thorpe's lure making DVD again. His opinion was that Northern Castor is the best. He said that Washington and Oregon has the best castor. And Canada is the best of all. I bought some from Wisconsin that I like real good a few years back. His opinion not mine. I like anything Mr. Dobbins makes and respect his opinion.

I can confirm that Backbreaker does work jim dandy on Oregon beaver.

Agree with lureintheanimal on Northern castor does have draw in colder temps compared to southern lazy bvr castor......LOL...

Years ago Edwin Hawbaker looked at me as if I offered him a turd when I tried to sell him our castors here....he wanted nothing but far northern castors where they ate "sweet stuff". Not these pine eating turpentine smelling castors.

If northern castor was superior to sothern castor, wouldn't it command a higher price like northern beaver do? Perhaps I should offer less for the substandard southern castor.

I prefer southern castor it comes in a nice jar

Good point. It seems to all grade the same at the Canadian auctions. You would think that the Perfumers would be more concerned about what the beaver were eating since it effects the smell of the castors. But it may not be an issue with them. Or maybe they do like to buy from certain parts of the country for various or regional castor.

Maybe with this we could get a price break.