Good for you taking a ride along BP
Doesn't it figure though sub par catch for you and the kits.
Bet he didn't think so though. A nice day on the line with a good man and a take home dinner wrapped in a fur coat. What more could a man ask for. I'm sure the education he got from you was priceless. Way to pass it on.

My friend in Montana sent me this yesterday, quite a color difference compared to our beaver.

BP, good for you helping that fellow trapper, Wyatt Erpp text me this morning, another day another beaver. I think he’s on the right track.

Get a light-colored one occasionally in the deep South.

Swamp, my first thought looking at that beaver is it's an Irish beaver.

Some of the color difference around the country may have to do with diet, but there are a lot of different sub-species of beaver in the country and among differences they may have are fur color.

In Oregon we have three sub-species: Castor canadensis pacifica, shasta, and idoneus With the idoneus being a bit smaller and darker with longer guard hairs.

All the ones I'm catching are the predominant sub-species pacifica

Not sure of any subspecies ID here. I usually get 4 or 5 very pale beavs per year. Several that are medium pale & many that are "normal" color, and a few that are very dark brown...nearly black.

Number 19 from the slough unless you count what the tit sow was carrying yesterday, then it's number 24...

Spent a little time in the shop tonight, got a couple done, few more for tomorrow and we’ll have the fresh ones caught up.

How come the leather looks so dark on that one on the right,Newfox.
A little too long in the water?

Boco, I don't know, all these beaver were caught in same spot, some are white as can be, some are dark, it seems the smaller ones are dark. They were caught this past week. I know he had one 48 hour check, the rest were 24 hr. Checks. Have you seen this before.? There were 13 beaver in this colony. They are exceptionally fat.

Even the dark one was fat? Usually when I have darker beaver in later season the overall health of the beaver is suspect and they rarely have much fat. What did the fur side look like?

BP, here’s a couple that are off the boards, both seem well fured.

Yep, they do. The darker one looks better up close than when it was on the board leather wise. Looks like a late November pelt for Oregon.

Here’s a nice prime Adirondack beaver.



Nice dark otter

Fat otter and dandy Adirondack beaver. I heard that otters hit $75 at the latest Montana Assoc. fur sale.

Well that’s it on otter.. time to avoid em now and keep plugging away on beaver. Finished up with 9 males and just one female this year. Now time to run down DNR for the CITES tags in time to get most of them off in time.

Pretty good run on the otters Mud. I've only caught two this year. Might try for them a bit in March for the last two weeks of our season.

BP, $75 otter sounds good.

Yes it does doesn't it? In the western assoc. sales all the otter are going into the craft market so it's just a matter of who wants them. One of the bigger buyers is right at $60 on most otter so if anybody else wants to pick any up they have to beat his offer. It's all silent bid so a bit of a guessing game. I got spoiled because a few years ago the $60 guy was at $80! So now $60 doesn't get me much excited.

Don't think I'll see $75 otter down here....even for my best ones....and even if they're put up. Be fortunate if a $20/avg...

Have 27 as of today with 10 days to go. All captured in beaver 330s. If I had targeted otter this winter I could have stacked em up. Water conditions have been and remain perfect and otter sign is EVERYWHERE!

All mine will be sold green/frozen.

Caught this one this morning

Skint, fleshed, and boarded. Fleshed and boarded a beav and otter I caught last week. I know some of yous do this in your sleep, but that's a LONG day in my shed!