I am blessed in Wyoming with possibly the least intrusive trapping regs that exist. Ethics and morals come into play before any regs do. There is a small breakdown for snares and that is about it. On the part of the question though i have not had any luck setting colonies right at the entrance. I don't know why really. It seems logical they would hit it just like they would a 110 but my colony trapping luck has been in the runs away from the holes. This could highly be affected by my ability as well though lol.

Besides the county road dept kills most of the beaver colonies close to the road during the summer and early fall before season when hides aren't prime so you have to get back in to make it work or trap spring time.... Just makes it frustrating and more work grrr

Back in the day I used 12" by 36" funnels put in the bank run or culvert DEADLY most in a bank 7 in one night culvert 14... that's a lot of snap traps that didn't need to be set and I had them not the competition

Here is a fave first skim ice run as fast as you can to known areas flag all the runs because I only had 20 such bulky traps... then you can simply roll thru in open water and keep those colonies rotating into fresh runs as you'll get 95% that first night if you hit every run might as well pull next morning... and for those that say leave seed in the pothole areas it really isn't a concern if anything it helps so that the pond is fresh for the ones coming from back in next spring... besides one dry spell or deep freeze they're all dead

Geez- I just asked a question, didn't plan on kicking the hornets nest wide open lol.

As always, appreciate the feedback and insights.

Catcollector, my limited experience with colony traps and bank dens has been different. The area I trap is mostly cattail huts with a few bank dens sprinkled in along shore. The last 2 years I've trapped that area exclusively for rats and had traps working 2-3 weeks. Even towards the end as I was getting ready to pull, I was still getting rats in the colony traps. 2 years ago when I pulled almost 100 rats from that spot, I bet 12-15 came from a single bank den. That was over a 3 week span.

I guess what I'm say is, if you are going to be in an area anyway, it pays to keep a colony trap guarding a bank den as long as you're there. I always set mine in the runs within a foot or two of the entrance, not jammed right into the hole.

The reason there Is a RUN Is because the rat Is swimming on the bottom. So a colony trap placed anywhere In that run will take those rats using It. Lots of times the water Is deeper the farther you are from the den entrance so you have a better chance of getting that trap completely submerged.

A funnel trap set in the channels below a beaver dam will take tons of rats too.

Tlguy, The locations I'm talking are bank dens high bank in road ditch where all the rats are drilled... Seriously I've wiped out the entire pond in one night but ya gotta hit every run... they got no where to hide, but if you can't hit every run then yeah you'll have residuals so leave a few extra days, culverts I'll leave all season as long as they're pinging and not too far out the loop... When prices were good I ran longline took thousands of rats, man I miss those 18 hr days and 11 dollar averages...