Should I be building snares for beaver and planning to catch riverbank bobcats and beaver?

Hope so, with the decline of the Yellowstone tv audience and its popularity...it makes a beaver trapper wonder??

Should hold for this season. I'd sell early and often as opportunities present themselves. Not sure if it will hold for the '24/'25 season

Im curious.

What kind of average do you have to get on your beaver in order to feel like its worth your while to trap them?

Do you trap for beaver every season but go for them harder when the markets up or do you only set for them when the markets high?

I talked to a guy yesterday who's planning on buying 2 or 3 dozen connis.. and i wondered if he'd catch enough fur to pay for the trapa.

I dont think it's gonna last. Likely will be weaker by this coming spring. But, it has been good enough that Boco and I were able to maintain a lengthy beaver marketing discussion recently...lol.

The industry reports for felt project solid growth for the next five years. It's not just western hats driving the market, felt fedoras are also doing well on a worldwide level. The question is how much of a premium will the hatters continue to pay for beaver felt? There are other felt sources

Last year was the first year in a long time that I didn't set a single beaver set. Usually do local beaver control as needed. Unfortunately for me I had hit it pretty hard for the three seasons prior and didn't have any beaver to trap on the places I have permission. Well now I have acquired a boat with access to two rivers, one with a ramp about a 1/4 mile away and the other with a ramp about 3 miles away. Lots of river that could be worked with minimum fuel usage. Already have the goods(cable,locks,swivels,etc.) to build 100 snares, own a couple dozen 330's, and about the same in footholds. I would be happy with a $10 green beaver average added to the $15 bounty.
As for cats, I can catch some running the river banks but would do much better in the pine plantations which is not exactly beaver country. The cat trapping would cost more in fuel but would likely average better than beaver. Of course a flood stage river would kill the beaver line or lazy kitties lack of movement, during the time off I have to trap, would make for a disappointing plantation run.

J, I haven't asked permission to trap anything for many many decades. Public access rivers and lakes is where it's at...especially for beaver.

Yes, that is a big benefit. I've seen your catches of otter and beaver. High water would be my only obstacle. Having access to two rivers so close by would helpful for me too.

High water accounts for some of my bigger catches. Just as it starts to recede all the beaver are out refreshing their mudpies and I can set on real hot sign.

I spring trapped a little for the first time this year and it was a blast. I am certainly looking forward to doing that again!

I would not worry about the beaver market this season, the demand is there for now.

Castor market on the other hand will probably drip some more with the increase in production.

Take advantage of the increase beaver prices while they last.

If you have the opportunity sell your beaver as quickly as you can sell them, the little bit more that I guy can get shipping is easily offset by catching more.

One nice thing about Castor is it is easy to store in the freezer.

I always recommend selling early and often if you have that option.

If interested you I'd make some snares and have some fun..especially since you're relatively close to the animal.population.

Here we have to drive 5 hrs one way to really get into any beaver.

My history with beaver was if i got a 21.00 average it was during a year i was trying to avoid 2.00 beaver, then the next year id go gang busters and get my usual 6.00 average for put up beaver then go back to trying to avoid the muddy beast. So with that in mind, id sit out the beaver season, lol.

Already waiting on the post from those jumping into beaver trapping hard and heavy in the south claiming groney ripped them off, only got 5 dollars for their 30 dollar beavers, lol.

That's my luck. About 2 years ago I sold several for $3 green. After that they became 'nuisance' animals. So last year having none to catch for the locals I thought it was a blessing. Boy was I wrong. Lol.

Sure won't be me. ALL of my beaver trapping is nuisance-related. It will continue to be so. It is nice to get good prices on these flat pelts, but even with $20 + avgs for these beavers...that ain't enough for me to start beaver fur trapping. Plus, if I was to do that, I'd hurt myself financially because landowners would start expecting "free" beaver trapping and there would be less nuisance issues.

Be nice if prices stay up, but either way about all I do is damage control on beaver so them prices are set.
When they cause trouble not many people complain on prices, and if I'm to high I tell them thank you for calling.

Well your land owner's may not need ya anymore if tom dick and harry come around asking if they can trap beaver, lol. I know during the otter craze my work load got alot lighter, nuts running around chasing 100 dollar otter in every ditch they came too took out ALOT of beaver in the process.

Very true, let them have at it .

It's my fun job lol, just better keep the better job that pays well.

No other trappers in my area....especially fur trappers.....and no knowledgeable nuisance beaver trappers.

I'll take the same amount of beaver I always have for the last 40 years on my lines.
Its all about keeping the trapline healthy.
You dont manage beaver based on the price of the pelts if you want to have a productive RTL.

That's a nice advantage you Canadians have. Around here if you don't kill em somebody else will

For me big beaver catches mean I have to do a lot of traveling. My motus operandi is to set a stretch of 15 miles of river with maybe 20-30 traps, do three checks and move on to the next stretch of river, or another watershed altogether. That way I always leave plenty of seed for next year. But when I set my mind to it I can catch 500+ beaver in a season. And the next year too. Just more territory to cover.

BP, given idea conditions running the river line how many do you think you take on a 10 day run?

...and no knowledgeable nuisance beaver trappers.


Well that's even worse when you have to go clean up their mess, lol. Had a couple of those last winter, got less hair on my head now than before if that's possible, lol.

Under ideal conditions (which rarely align in my experience) about 10-15 beaver per day. But I rarely trap a straight 10 days without taking off a few days in there to catch up on skinning. I'm usually too tired to skin after running river all day. Not a youngster anymore.

As long as your trapped fur prices are dependant on value-added, finished, durable goods, your fur prices will always be cyclic. There are any number of sources available from which felt can be manufactured from. When the market for high quality, high priced goods becomes saturated, prices will either fall and/or beaver will be replaced with more inexpensive alternatives until the next fad comes along.

Just my thoughts, snares are inexpensive (relatively) so for the upcoming season; yes, I'd build some snares for beaver. Not sure I would be putting big $$$ into additional traps for beaver. Beyond the upcoming season, I'd watch inventory and price action within the markets.

Lets hope

Enjoy trapping beaver where and when you can, here in WA there is a movement to ban not only trapping beaver but trapping period

Jingles is right. There is a movement right now that identifies beaver as critical keystone species that improve drought stricken areas, restore wildlife habitat and reverse global warming. In Oregon we have been doing our best to fend off new legislation brought by these groups. We already lost one battle about recreational beaver trapping on private forestlands.

The market will hold strong unless I decide to hit beaver strong, then it will collapse!! Maybe someone should start a “go fund me” page for me to keep me from trapping!!

The anti's argument here in Colorado used to be that if you trap them, they become more prolific and have bigger litters, thereby creating bigger problems for landowners, public land road culverts, cutting down more trees along river banks creating more erosion, etc. Now they don't want them trapped at all so they can have more beaver to preserve the environment??

Cause you can only trap with live cages right?

Just got off the phone with a guy who talked to GFW today. He was told beaver would be “lower” this fall due to the Yellowstone TV show ending. Didn’t say how much lower.

Don’t kill the messenger, just passing on what the man told me.
I hope it’s BS as well. Lol

I knew a buyer that never failed to tell me in the off season to expect lower prices next season for reasons X,Y and Z. I always figured he wanted my fur for less and was brokering a better buyers position.

Probably got flack from end users for overpaying for the flat summer beaver,lol.
Avg down.Like I told you.

^^^They couldn't possibly end up happy with flat southern beaver felt yields compared to the northern stuff. Eventually the felters will demand that beaver get graded according to how much felt they will yield.

My source says yes, the market will hold.

GFW makes his own felt, so he is the end user. He just adjusted some existing machine to the felt setting.

Possibly.

But, that don't mean the market wants those northern heavies any more than they do today. So, the prices at auction will drop too...

My nuisance trapping service charge ain't dropping.

That should increase the competition at auction for the fuller pelts.Might see guys get back into the high production under ice March beaver runs here in the north again.

Only if the hatter market holds up. Admit it...market don't have a big enough demand for your northern beavers either. When the felt market tanks those dark heavy northerns will bottom out again too. At least my castor will go up.

Not a soul on this site, or anyone else for that matter, is not annoyed at getting less for what we pay for, and we all want good value. Folks making Fedora's, Resistol's, Stetson's, or any other beaver felt product surely feel the same. Take it from there. Just extra validated your post Carl!!

Groenewold's felt customers are not getting less than what they pay for. He's selling already baled felt to clients. So if the change you speak of occurs it will be mostly at the auction level and beaver trappers/shippers will be the ones that are adjusted.

For argument sake (all bonified T man members love arguments, LOL) let's say 100 northern beaver pelts average out in weight at 170 lbs of which 70 lbs is pure felt. The end user paid an average of $33 per pelt so he's got $3300 plus broker and FHA expenses added on. He may have $57/lb invested in that raw felt. Now let's say he buys 100 southern beaver at that same average but only yield half as much felt. 35 lbs. Now is raw felt is costing mebbe a little north of $100 lb.

People who push pencils in these companies will soon figure out that not all beavers pelts are equal and they'll demand getting what they pay for.

Plus the hats will fall apart when made from short felt fibres.

Agree^^^

But I've yet to hear an explanation as to how or why GFW purchased beaver as they did last spring.. According to the above synopsis ofthe felt market....GFW lost money.....but I'd bet my fur check that they did not. Time will tell.

And Canadians will still buy them.

Just the wannabe yankee Canadians in Alberta.

Now felt is sold in bales?

My argument has nothing to do with Groenwold or his buying practices. I'm focused on how FHA sorts and sells gd dmg beaver. Not to beat a dead horse (or beaver) but changes are coming and southern beaver will not be valued as high as they are under the the current scarcity of beaver. IMHO

There is a scarcity of beaver in the lower 48? I thought there was so many people paid to have them killed?

Has the hatter market ever adjusted like this? ^^^^^^

That's affirmative cage traps only although for beaver, otter and rats can be swim through drowning traps.

This market is not like the coyote market, where there was a natural limit of supply of GOOD coyotes. There is no natural limit to the supply of low quality beaver, or beaver that people can make low quality or can catch when of low quality, if the current price excites them.

Low numbers of pelts offered into the market is what I meant.

No, I don't think I've seen that. But when felters could buy hatter type beaver for around $9-10 avg I don't think there was much concern about the differences.

The title is will the beaver market hold? No it will fluctuate.

The market still sucks guys, the top price did not go up at all, the bottom came up and increased the averages a bit is all. So was it nice to get paid more for LM SLT DMG beaver sure but my 3X select HVY, still sold for the same average which sucks. Unless the "whole" market improves would not say the Beaver market is hot.

Think it was Beaverpeeler who said his DMG sold more than his SLT's in the same size. So why not throw the crap into the market if that's what they are paying for, they certainly did not reward the higher grade pelts.

^^^^Yup!

A very good description of what has occurred...^^^^^

Is there any indication that the HVY beaver pelt market will improve? If not, then very soon, I'm betting the overall market falls back to where we were b4 this hatter craze.

All them silky yankee beaver being shredded up with these floor mat southern beaver, what a shame, lol. I doubt you ever see a market for the better beaver again, China pretty much goofed that up forever.

Were beaverpeelers sold at FHA? I believe so. Sometimes it’s luck of the draw which lot your fur lands in. Like the bidders can’t keep up or miss something. Same graded fur, different lot, and one will go 4 bucks more than the last. I noticed while watching that sometimes they’d jump back 10 lots or you could hear a bidder asking if he got lot 123 which was done 20 lots before. Beaver are clearing out and they realize they haven’t filled their order.

The antis must be bummed out that the beaver market is on the upswing.

Do you think the antis even know what felt is made out of? I'm not sure they even know what leather is made out of.

They dont even know what meat is made of.

No

Vegan felt made from Spanish moss. It's coming ....bet on it!

So what's the verdict? Should I plan my line with beaver in mind or forget about these mid south felt-less beaver and just concentrate on cats?

Why not both? Lean towards cats and hit a bit of water along the way if you can.

If you can sell them green, I would trap them. If not, the risk of loss is increased along with the work involved, if everybody goes all in and floods the market, which is a REAL possibility with low quality beaver in a market where almost every other furbearer is selling at rock bottom prices.

Beaver will do fine this coming season. And ya'll know I'm never wrong!

Did you ever see the "felt" on vegan women's legs? Shears that stuff off and the market would collapse!

Send the felt-less beaver to me and I'll sell them for up to $40 each. Just skin em and freeze em. Ship em to me on a Monday so I'll get em b4 they thaw....lol

Marten is looking good,rising on the last two auction sales with avg of 55 and 60 respectively after deductions on my statement.Much better than the 25 avg couple years ago.
Money to be made there for sure especially if the marten are thick.I will set for them this year.
Lynx price is also on the rise though not high enough yet per sq in for such a quality species.Numbers are on the ebb now anyway.

Mike makes some good points about the smaller size beaver. I hadn't stopped to think about that but it sure does make sense.

Pi R squared. The problem with smaller beaver in the use of garments, at least for me, is the price of tanning is similar to the price for larger beaver. Thin leather of the smaller beaver is also not attractive. From a Pi R squared, a 60 inch beaver has 706 sq in fur ; a 40 inch beaver has 314 sq in. of fur. So for felting purposes a small beaver should be worth about half the price of a 1X. They are not selling beaver by the pound at FHA, but by the sq. inch. and other than damaged by quality.

PS. The FHA May 2023 Sold Catalog magically appeared on their website again if interested.

Don't look too close or you might notice the pattern Swamp Wolf has been talking about. Premium for low grade goods. Not much difference in price between a HVY (very dense underfur) and an LT (lacks underfur).

As far as Lynx goes, it appears FHA sectioned 52 from Alaska. Apparently we don't find FHA lynx prices that attractive. Not where I sold mine.

To market lynx in todays world you got to be a good grader.
I get good returns for tanned lynx and tanned lynx products,Of course some of this is value added,but not all.
I still ship surplus lynx to the auction,but those are the ones with the clear bellies.

Last time the felt market collapsed it was because of silk being used to make hats. Somehow I can't see silk Cowboy hats ever catching on. Might be a little to "Nancy".

Silk cowboy hats? Ask the Brokeback Mountain cowboys. Imagine most cowboys prefer real beaver though lol.

The size of a skin most certainly has everything to do with the amount of fiber available in the same weight grade of skin.
Dirt is also correct in that tanning costs for him(and me) to make articles from the smaller skins is prohibitive compared to having larger skins sent to the tanner for fur articles.
Not every beaver user makes felt hats.

"It's a hatter market. Everything you site has nothing to do with the amount or quality of underfur a put up beaver has."

I see, the size or the [quality ( density and length of underfur)] of the beaver hide has nothing to do with the total amount of underfur a beaver hide possesses to make felt. Good to know!

Mike, don't interject math into the conversation lol

"Quality" is the last word in my post.

Looks like buyers AT FHA were paying $30 to $39 for 60" beaver and about $10 on small 40" beaver. Probably making better money on the smalls from a felt perspective.

Hogwash.
There is way more fiber on a XXL hvy beav than a SM hvy beaver,even though the fiber is 3/4 to an inch in length on both and equal density,its the size(sq in) of the skin that makes the difference.

I get what Dirt is saying-you dont.
And yes the higher prices the felters paid for beaver at auction has driven up the prices of the beaver going to the garment market because they have to compete with the competition for the fur.
I have to increase the price of my beaver fur products because I need a premium to set aside pelts to tan since a lot of the tanner beaver are now higher priced at auction.

One more year ..my guy tells me.

Then the market will be flooded again....then back in the crappah.

So 9 bucks for an XS at auction,and about 4 xs equals about 1 xxl which goes for 40.

looks like similar price to me.

More like possibly three xs equals an xxl. If you run the numbers you will see that the buyers paid around 5 cents a square inch for LM's and up and only paid about 3.5 cents a square inch for MD and Small.( Hammer price). It will get a little closer with fees.

I guess I'm wondering if North America will ever produce the numbers of beaver it did a couple of decades ago or longer. Beaver trappers are dying out and not many new ones coming on.

I don't think there will ever be numbers produced as in the past.

Tman is a good indication. My guess is about 75% or more of us on here are 50+ years old. This is a snapshot of the aged NA trapper population. Once another decade passes by fur trapping decreases more and nuisance trapping opportunity increases...just like what has been happening. It's never going to turn around. Hate to sound so negative but trapping has been dying and will continue to do so.

Unless the economy crashes and fur trapping becomes necessary for survival, I'm afraid you are right. I am teaching my grandkids though.

Swamp it's been dead in the south pretty much since the late 80's when the traveling fur buyer's went out of business. Not alot of kids today going to get dirty scraping and drying hides even if price's were good. Im 57 so your correct, majority of us left are not spring chicken's anymore.

Oregon used to produce around 10,000-13,000 beaver a year for the fur trade. The latest numbers I've seen from a couple years back are around 1000. Criminy, I alone am catching about 15-20% of the (Oregon) harvest every year.

So with an uptick in felt demand worldwide....are we capable of oversupplying that need?

If furbuyers take most of the work out of it, probably. My guess.

No...I don't think there are enough of us to oversupply the current demand. That is why they are absorbing top grades of beaver into the felt market.

If the price keeps rising the supply will keep rising.

Stetson went bankrupt in 1986

They're owned by the company that makes.resitol now.


The northern felt brings more than the southern felt.. so technically I guess northern felt might be a better grade but they're making money on the southern felt at the price point they're paying or thy wouldn't be buying it at the price they're paying.

Cathryn, where did you hear or get the info on southern felt going for less than northern? I'd be interested to hear more about that.

Undeniably This!

Given proper monetary motivation we could still produce a large amount of beaver

Problem as I see it is lack of buyers and process capacity. At least in the lower 48

I believe it was stated in one thread a few weeks ago that at the peak,2 to 2.5 million beaver were in the market. Not enough beaver trappers left to produce those numbers.

Even Mike pointed out there is only half a beaver market going on. There is little to no garment market. Really only have to oversupply the market that does not demand quality. Lot easier to supply low quality beaver than high quality. Many places do not even have high quality.

I better define quality, no big rubs, holes, scars, bites, enough underfur and guard hairs to make a quality garment or a sheared garment and size Lg and above.

Very good point Dirt. Where I trap good beaver are only caught for about a 4-6 week time period. I remember an ol' timer who used to always say that nobody had any business trapping beaver in the Willamette valley after the middle of January. At the time I scoffed at that.... but truly, our open water beaver caught after breeding season in January tend to be bit up, rubbed, crapola beaver.

I find river beaver in spring open water will have a lot more dmg than pond beavers at the same time of year.
Not many trappers ever trapped open water here in spring in the old days.
Spring trapping was done under ice after the crust came on in march and bush travel was easy and pelts fully prime.
Water opens here around end of April.Season closes May 15
Some guys would trap open water or shoot beaver if they were a bit short on their quota.

River beaver and swamp beaver are terrible bad to be bit up. Sometimes even fall ones will be chewed up, and they will almost always be scarred to pieces compared to pond beaver in the little mountain streams where I have done the majority of my beaver trapping. Almost never trapped spring beaver myself, a lot of it for that reason.