Have any of you guys known beaver to feed on cedar? I snowshoed in to look for some beaver activity on a pond I hadn't been to for a couple of years and found this. It's not really a pond but it is a dammed-up deadwater. I poked around quite a bit looking for a lodge or a feed pile and found neither. The water isn't very deep and I don't know how they are navigating under the ice.

Starving beaver.

Not sure how much they actually eat it but they cut pine and cedar here whenever it is easily accessible. Cedar boughs hold mud in the dams real well.

I'm going to make a couple of sets in the morning. A 330 and a 750. I feel almost guilty trying to trap them instead of going on a rescue mission.

Very common in Maine.

^ This. Trap those buck toothed rodents.

When I was in VA when I was in the navy ,I use to go fishing with a guy of one of the rivers there and there was cedar trees the beavers was eating. I take it they take what ever there is in the area,

In my area beaver eating cedar is pretty common.

Common here. If they didn't eat it here they'd starve. White pine is eaten also. Normally I would say they were starving, but I have areas that are only white pine and conifer and while they prefer deciduous trees, they eat what they can get.

I know Boco was surprised to find my local beaver eating tag alder. In his part of the world, that suggests starvation. I've been around plenty of beaver flowages and this is the first time I recall beaver eating cedar. I can't say I've ever seen it in dam or lodge construction.

I checked out some biological information in the wildlife bible about beaver eating coniferous bark.
If beaver eat coniferous bark in the fall,or conifers are present in the feedpile,it indicates that there is a shortage of their preferred fall food which is deciduous bark/cambium.
However,in the springtime,the bark of conifers,particularly white pine,retains much more carbohydrate than deciduous at this time of year.This is thought to be a reason why beavers utilize conifer at this time of year.
Beavers can survive without conifer in the diet but cannot survive without deciduous in their diet.
So if you see coniferous in the feedpile in fall-trap them heavily as it means they can starve out from a lack of deciduous feed which is what they need to survive.
In the fall they will utilise alder as building material and to cap the feedpile.It can be used as feed also but indicates a shortage of preferred deciduous(aspen,willow,maple white birch).
Beaver eat a wide variety of grasses,leaves and pond plant and roots in summer,and are also coprophagic,which allows them to absorb the most nutrients available from their fibrous diet.They also eat A LOT.
Beaver are likely the most extensively studied furbearer.

Thorpe told me that this is quite common in the spring. Also will hit hemlock too.
He told me what he thought they were lacking in their diet but cannot for the life of me I cannot remember.

They eat on pines down here most any time, even when their preferred food is abundant. About the only time I hardly ever see them eating on pines is during the hot months of summer. They do eat aquatic vegetation here in the summer months.

I got a few lakes they prefer black oaks and cedar the birch trees are untouched. But they did destroy all the willows. In the summer they live off of corn! In 5 years ive never found a feed pile! And yes this lake freezes over! Do they pack old dens full of corn? I ask because in one lake when they get spooked they historically wont move for 4-5 days and will continue doing this for months! And ive never caught a big beaver in that lake. In 3 years ive taken a dozen out and the largest was 35lbs male

Interestingly, cedar is a good source of vitamin C, along with other conifers.

Back in the 1500's, when Jacque Cartier was exploring the region, his crew came down with scurvy. I've read that the Iroquois introduced him to some sort of conifer high in vitamin C. Maybe beavers need vitamin C too and cedar provides it for them. Or maybe they just picked a crappy place to spend the winter and cedar is all that's available now.

Hard to tell from the pic but it looks to me like they were trying to dig out some cattail roots. This is new since the last time I was there a week or so back. I had one 330 set with popple I'd cut elsewhere but wasn't optimistic going in and didn't bother to take my sled. I was going to pull the trap and call it a season. Walked right back to the truck and grabbed the sled after all. Nice strike right behind the ears.

Found this on my hike in.