afternoon checks. Can it be done without issues in non-drowning depth water? Educate me....

Here's what I have done. anchor your drowning cable on both ends. Place a stop about 2' from the deep end stake. This won't allow the beaver to get wrapped up and pull out or pull the stake. The cable acts like a shock absorber so a little slack should be left In the cable when staking It.
A beaver that Is well caught will tire out pretty fast If It can't touch bottom. Some will be dead and some will still be alive but In most cases they will still be there.

nothing to tangle up in,set for back foot only and 11 gauge wire or cable it to a limb that can act as a shock absorber.

A front foot catch will drown a beaver a lot quicker then a back foot catch.

In NON drowning situations I would'nt use a foothold . JMO

If the water is not sufficient to drown it in a foothold,use a 330.
If a nuisance job and not worried about a burn mark on the fur-Snare it.

Not what I’d want to attempt. A beaver’s front leg is tiny compared to its body mass. I’ve only watched a couple beavers actually get caught, but my gut tells me it’s not going to take long for one to wring off if it doesn’t quickly drown. The flip side, I’ve seen many beaver held only by a toenail that would obviously have escaped if it weren’t for the fact they were on a drowning slider.

Lots of swivels and setting to catch a hind foot would help, but I personally won’t set a leg grip unless it’s attached to a slide wire into a drowning depth of water.

The Beav is spot on. Hold a beaver by the front legs (rear foot catch). Then hold by the rear legs. Consider water depth. Front foot catch only!

Well In some situations you may not be able to use a BG trap. But your right If you can come up with a alternate plan that would be the way to go.

There are beaver trappers that will let the beaver get up on the bank. No entanglement and plenty of swivels. These trappers tell me It works to perfection. But for one I have never tried It.

My thinking too.

I am confronted with these conditions a lot right now as our rivers are at historic low winter flows. I have to just pass on a lot of good sign. Maybe get back to these spots when/if the river rises.

The water is not but about a foot deep. What is occurring is that I have caught dang near a dozen beaver at a particular crossover so the beaver are becoming wise to this. They have created new crossovers across land in avoidance of this crossover. I plan on placing a snare at each new trail but I thought of leaving one open, except for a foothold, to check if I'm beginning to have avoidance of snares. I use kill traps and snares to eliminate them all as I go and keep the foothold ready for if/when they become educated. I'm documenting this trap line on my phone and hope to share it here on t-man. Has been absolutely the most beaver I have ever caught in a confined area.

Ive done this....it works

If You cant set with a330 or 280

That's pretty shallow for the system I use. I wouldn't hesitate to use my system In 3' of water and even 2' of water.

I had a smart one this season that seen one before it get in a snare, The water is not deep enough to set a 330 or 280. It had sprung the snare at every time it went to get some corn. What I end up doing is take one of the footholds I use for coyote trapping that is 4 coil that is a #3 and stake it that when the chain is out fully that it is still in the water but the beaver could not get on dry land and there is no way to get wrap up in anything. I normal cross stake my coyote traps and done the same with this trap but use 4' stakes stake in the deep part. then for guild the beaver I use 2 sticks and make a V with the wide part case the water and the small open where its trail up the bank . the next day after I set it the beaver was wait for me alive . Got it by the front foot .high catch on it .

My experience, most beaver go down the line like clockwork however there’s always that one that won’t retreat down the line and does just the opposite.

I'm one of those. If no possible entanglement well swiveled long chain works great front or back. If tangled not so much for front.

Unfortunately, the only places I find perfectly clear banks is manicured subdivision ponds leading to other issues with beaver on a leash in plain view.

It sounds ideal for cages.

Warrior do cages work when the colony has been decreased significantly? I've used no bait or lure as of yet so a lured cage would be completely new to them.
Two paper lunch sacks full to the brim with castor, started on the third today.

They do wonders for me. I especially like them on solo hermits as it highly unlikely they've ever seen a cage.

3 ft. chain on a big trap, hind foot catch, let him flop around all day. Long chains got started by mtn. men I guess and someone got it going again in recent days and it took me awhile to go with it, since then you can shorten the chain up to 3 ft. if you have a good staking system, less room for them to roam around and get tangled up.

Snare's in the new cross over's though solve most of your problems.