I'll hazard a guess that our glacier river beaver carry some underfur all summer. I bet our glacier rivers are colder in summer than Georgia streams are in winter.

I thought them saying that was from 2014 so I wonder if it’s accurate saying those blue skin beaver are unusable for hatters now that they’re is a higher demand?

And they do carry some glacial silt in that under fur. I worked some beaver that my son In law caught and you couldn't get It out.
Sell those beaver by the LB.

If it gets on the leather side, "Sandpaper Beaver" It comes out in the tanning.

Big brood female today....

This is her underfur in center of her back. Her leather is white as snow, too.

Lets see it when stretched and dried.
The fur looks very thin.
In the WFSC under "anatomy and physiology of fur growth-the pelt priming process"it states that each hair follicle holds 1 hair in summer after the molt and before telogen(start of the growth phase)(aquatic species only have 1 molt).During the anagen(active hair growth phase))there will be 6 derived follicles for each hair follicle,in other word 6 times the density of a summer pelt.The density of the under fur remains during the Catagen phase(dormancy commonly called peak prime) until the molt starts and the derive follicles are reabsorbed (shedding),also fur does not grow and molt over the entire pelt at the same time in order not to shock the animal,but starts mid back and mid belly and progresses over a time period.

So even though there may be some underfur in summer after the molt,it will be weak and thin,like in your second pic.
This is why like Phil explained in the vid the grader runs his hand thru a beaver pelt in order to grade it by feel of reisitance in the fingers,rather than just looking at it.

Why would I scrape and board a southern hatter beaver that is currently averaging over $20 just skint and frozen? About all we have down here are hatters grades. Rarely a winter-caught XL or bigger one may go semi-heavy (but will be downgraded to dmgd due to bites, etc.) Itt is simply not worth the extra effort and time to put up these beaver. I did it a few years, but that was back when I had to ship them north (NAFA era). What a HUGE waste of time and not much monetary return. But, I can't stand to pitch any furbearer. I'm glad these southern beavs have a felt value...

BTW....Im not saying these beavs are top quality heavies comparable to northern beavers, as they definitely are not. But, there is a hatter value to these beavs and even summer caught are not much different than those captured in winter. They're are not worthless junk.

If you catch another summer Canadian beaver...post a pic....I've never seen one with very thin/or no underfur. Those probably do look pitiful.

According to the video posted by Shakeyjake, the vast majority of our southern beaver have no value for the hatter market. So why do we have folks running routes in the south to buy them for the hatter market?

But the video was made by a company that went belly up. Maybe they did not have all of the answers they thought they had.

Swamp, I generally agree with you about not fleshing and stretching our southern beaver but I did see some blankets sell for $38 and slightly smaller still bringing $30-$32. If those prices hold, may be worth the effort.

If you stretch and dry a summer beaver the pelt will be blue even if it looks white when skint.The pelts start to shade in from the back of the neck and flanks as shedding occurs then all over very dark as the telogen phase of hair growth starts again.
This is due to the blood supply to the new hair roots which emerge deep in the skin.

We do have some northern beavers here in NC. Back in the 60's NC made some sort of a deal with PA for some beavers to stock our streams. Those beavers from PA were originally transplanted from Wisconsin. Those beavers I caught here brought top dollar when I use to ship to NAFA. I had some go as high as $88 in the early 1990's. After all those years, they still have the nice fur. Those type of beavers may be the ones that brought $30-$32.

Phil Patterson has forgot more about beaver grading than all of us on here combined know about it.
Dont forget on the vid he is talking to the people from the industry who use the pelts.In the clip on felting he is talking to the felter and what the felter needs to make felt.beaver felts because the underfur has hooks and when carroted the hooks on the underfur lock together to make it super strong.
Felt is made from the beaver underfur-they want semi hvy or hvy pelts for felting.There is 1/6 the amount of underfur density on a summer beaver than a beaver in the catagen phase.
Hair growth physiology has been extensively studied (and well documented) in all animals and the data is availble and footnoted to the many individual studies in the WFMC.
Every trapper should have acess to the WFMC.
They are working on a new edition that will be out within the next couple years that will add to the science..

WFSC( Wild Fur Shippers Council)? I thought this went bye bye with NAFA?

Georgia DNR re-located beaver here in the 60s and 70s. If they only had put a little thought into that....lol

Northern / southern/summer winter.. it doesn't matter when or where they are cauggt in the beaver market.now.. because they're all going by the pound.

The by the pound beaver buyers don't care if they're blue or not. The just pile em on the scale and weigh them.
jerry had half a beaver hide that the buyer said had the same value per pound as his others and he threw it on the scale..weighed it..with the others..and paid the same price per pound.

Typo,WFMC,thanks Dirt,lol.

WFMC. What Boco is talking about is "Wild Furbearer Management and Conservation in North America" aka the Bible. Put out in 1987 and 1450 pages. Can not do justice to describe it but anyone serious about understanding more about the fur animals, and much more related to them, should have it. A second edition is being worked on. Believe ShakeyJake started a thread on it not too long back.

Boco, the fella in the video might have been spot on at the time the video was made. His facts may still be accurate but it does not change the reality of the current beaver market for hatters.

At approximately 8:30 of the video he states that only winter caught Heavy or Semi Heavy beaver are suitable for the hatter market. A few of our southern beaver may grade Heavy or Semi Heavy but a lot more of them will not. Yet they are being bought frozen where it is impossible to grade them and they are being bought for the hatter market by multiple buyers. These buyers can not tell the early or late caught from the winter caught when they are frozen but they are buying every beaver they can get their hands on.

I can only assume they are not taking a big loss on them as they are still in business and are still buying so it stands to reason that there is some value there.

Somewhere in the pipeline they may get micro graded and priced accordingly? If a northern prime beaver has 6 times the felting underfur, it should be worth 6 times more to the end user.

This^^^ is what's occurring....^^^^^^

QBD,
The buyers dont seem concerned about early caught, late, etc.
Buyer can see the fur side but not skin side...if folded ĺike reccommended. I did witness several trappers get lower avgs that sold balled up frozen beavs.

Depends on number of folks handling them in that pipeline. If only trapper...one fur buyer....one processor.....one hat maker...then a deal is a deal.