I deal with a few bears when predator trapping, but have never had one mess with a caught beaver. Thank goodness we have no wolves. Have had a bobcat chew on a dead beaver a few times.

I've experienced the same thing with bears Les. I don't know how many body grips bears drug off with the beavers over the past 30 years. It is a bunch. I consider the loss of those traps just part of doing business here. Thankfully, there were no wolves where I worked.

Same here, maybe get one once in a while like that, but around here they don’t call me to pay for beaver removal until everything else fails, and a setup like that just lets the beavers know the man is in town and time to lay low.

I have run a lot of video of beavers over the years, and have a folder labeled “beaver interacting with caught beaver”, and what I can tell you, after hours of watching reactions, is that it is not something you can predict with any degree of certainty. That said, I do find that an alive beaver, no matter of it is a snare or foothold, is a huge attraction to other beavers. They sometimes hang out with the caught one for several spells through the night, visit often, and aren’t the least bit afraid. Beyond that, as in the NEXT night, no bet is a good bet. Some will avoid the area, others will visit many times checking out where the other one was caught.
As for dead beavers in BGs, again no bet is a good bet either the while the beaver is there dead or the next night. Some slap their tails and avoid, some literally climb over the dead one to get where they are going. Some come back next night, some won’t be seen again in that spot. Of course these observations may have shown different results in a different region or under ice. I quit trapping when the water is hard because it rarely freezes deep enough for real under ice trapping here.

Live beaver in a snare is fighting and struggling, scaring all the other's to death. Live beaver in a foothold just wander's around, grooms, etc. Not really doing anything to suggest it's in distress.

I have not seen this in my video collection. Beavers in snares fight hard for maybe 30 seconds or a minute, then most calm down and study the situation for a minute or so, then fight and flop again, and this goes on for maybe 5 minutes. Then, they calm way down and maybe every 5 minutes they work on the snare a bit more, or they occupy themselves chewing any saplings that entangle them, or just ambling about the circle, but not with the same panic or determination as they did at first.
Although I would agree with the jist of your post, as my observation is that that they fight less with footholds than snares, but that is a generalization and varies by individual beavers. Most fight either one intermittently and fight hardest right at first.
I had a cell cam watching a setup with 2 snares this past spring, and clearly had a number of pictures of a beaver in one of them in the water a few times through the night. The camera stops working at 7:30 am, and I arrived at the location about 3:00pm to find two beavers, a medium in the water and a big big (yes, that is an actual standardized beaver size system…) in the dryland snare. Odd thing was that the big big on land not only had no circle, but nothing was disturbed, not even my little snare support split-stick. The fresh spring greens were standing up and no disturbances. Dragging them out, I stopped to take a break and thought about that last picture at 6:30 am. Was the big big there then? Sure enough, when I looked I could just see its head at the side of the picture. So it was there at least from 6:30 am until 3:00 pm and NEVER MADE A SINGLE CIRCLE. It was in exactly the same spot, cable stretched tight toward the water, facing inland, for at least 8-1/2 hours. And it just pulled harder when it saw me, no side to side or lunging or anything. So yeah, every one is an individual and some do unexpected stuff that can be very different than all the rest.

Agreed, you know its going to be tough when you see fencing like that on the initial walk through.

Warrior,
When I see that fencing I just shake my head and tote the footholds on over to the dam.

A well made pressure set will take the last beaver 90% of the time.
I save it for last.For a beaver that has been educated by some rookie,I use a canopy over the trap at the pressure set or over a run.
If beaver were scared of a few sticks they wouldnt be able to leave the den,lol.
Sticks are intergral to their environment.

Your methods won't keep you employed down here.

You're welcome down here any time.

I have heard similar BS from mink trappers.
As if they know where a man made line is on a map,lol.
A beaver is a beaver and a mink is a mink.

I got a pretty deep bag of sets that take beaver,Im sure I could find a few.

And we have 90°+ three months out of the year and our water never gets hard.

To a degree a beaver is a beaver, ours do feed beds as well, but summer beavering in the heat is a whole nother world.

Not about a line on a map.

Your beavers only have you after them. These beavers (when I'm called) have sometimes had 3 or 4 trappers/shooters/landowners after them.

Not true.
I have cleaned out lots of beaver that had been worked over for weeks by the section crew trappers.
Every year for years.

Boco,
About all I recall you post pics of (related to beaver sets) were bodygrips. And some talk about a snare pole under ice occassionally.

A 330 on a crossover here, especially in summer, is about as useless as teats on a boar hog.

I never took any pics until I retired from full time beaver control.
I can post you pics of beaver in every type of set legal here.
Snares Footholds Bodygrips and shot.

I saw some pics you posted of crossovers and BGs you posted a few weeks ago.

I take 90% of my nuisance beaver with bodygrips.
100% of fur beaver.